^xvcxi-- <^CX^  <*.  ^^y     *£/ 


FREDERICK  DOUGLASS 


The   Colored  Orator. 


BY 

FREDERIC    MAY    HOLLAND, 

Author  of"  The  Reign  of  the  Stoics,"  "  Stories  from  Robert  Browning: 
"  The  Rise  of  Intellectual  Liberty,"  etc. 


FUNK   &    WAGNALLS. 

TORONTO,  CAN. :         NEW  YORK :  LONDON  : 

86  BAY  STREET.      i8&2o  ASTOR  PLACE.    44  FLEET  STREET. 

1891. 

PRINTED  IN   THE   UNITED  STA  TES. 
All  Rights  Reserved. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1891,  by 

FUNK    &   WAGNALLS, 
2n  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress  at  Washington,  D.  C. 


PREFACE. 


THE  invitation  to  write  this  life  was  readily  ac 
cepted,  partly  because  I  hoped  it  would  in  some 
degree  reduce  the  color-prejudice,  with  other  preju 
dices  also,  and  partly  because  I  have  always  felt  an 
admiration  for  Mr.  Douglass,  which  has  increased  as 
I  have  come  to  know  him  thoroughly.  His  consent 
was  cordially  given  in  a  letter,  where  he  says :  "  If 
you  can  say  anything  of  me  that  the  public  does  not 
already  know,  by  all  means  tell  it.  I  am  sure  you 
cannot  say  anything  of  me  which  will  not  be  pretty 
strongly  colored,  but  go  ahead."  Shortly  before 
departing  to  Hayti  he  was  kind  enough  to  answer 
many  questions  which  I  put  to  him  in  his  house,  on 
Cedar  Hill,  and  to  relate  anecdotes  which  will  be  new 
to  my  readers.  He  also  lent  me  ten  of  his  unpub 
lished  lectures,  and  so  many  other  manuscripts  and 
rare  pamphlets,  that  I  have  been  able  not  only  to 
mention,  but  to  quote  more  than  a  hundred  works  by 
an  author  not  admitted  to  a  place  among  the  forty-six 
thousand  writers  of  English  enrolled  by  Allibone. 

The  list  of  published  speeches,  etc.,  in  the  Appendix 
has  been  made  as  complete  as  possible  by  inquiry  in 
various  directions.  Much  valuable  information  was 
obtained  from  Mr.  Frederick  Douglass,  Jr.,  whose 


992 


IV  PREFACE. 

scrap-books  gave  me  abundance  of  material  about 
the  later  years  of  his  father's  life.  By  far  the  most 
difficult  part  of  my  work  has  been  that  relating  to 
the  decade  just  before  the  war ;  and  here  I  was 
greatly  aided  and  encouraged  by  the  letters  of  remin 
iscences  contributed  by  Miss  Sallie  Holley,  Mrs.  Lucy 
N.  Colman,  and  another  lady  who  knew  Mr.  Douglass 
in  Rochester.  For  these  and  other  extraordinary 
opportunities  I  am  very  grateful. 

More  generally  known  sources  of  information,  like 
the  files  of  the  "  Liberator,"  have,  of  course,  been 
examined  thoroughly.  Among  the  most  valuable  of 
books  to  me  has  been  the  "  Life  of  Garrison,"  by  his 
sons,  who  kindly  supplied  advance  sheets  and  per 
mitted  me  to  make  copious  extracts.  This  favor  I 
should  have  been  glad  to  repay  more  fully,  but  unfor 
tunately  there  were  some  serious  Differences  of  opin 
ion  between  their  hero  and  mine,  under  circumstances 
now  but  little  known  to  readers  generally.  Here  it 
becomes  my  plain  duty  to  try  and  vindicate  Doug 
lass,  even  at  the  expense  of  a  great  philanthropist 
whom  all  delight  to  honor.  Desire  to  do  sufficient 
justice  to  important  questions  has  suggested  some 
comments  on  the  Harper's  Ferry  tragedy,  socialism, 
and  the  Southern  problem  ;  but  it  did  not  seem  neces 
sary  to  do  more  than  give  the  orator's  views  about 
prohibition,  the  tariff,  and  the  merits  of  various  can 
didates  for  President  ;  and  I  hope  I  have  not  shown 
myself  too  party-colored. 

F.  M.  H. 


CONTENTS. 


Preface  ..........................................     Hi,  iv 

CHAPTER  I. 
The  Slave  ........................................       7-31 

CHAPTER  II. 
The    Fugitive  .....................................     32~5^ 


CHAPTER  III. 
The  Crusader  .....................................     57-80 

CHAPTER  IV. 
".Confident  Against  the  World  in  Arms  "  .............  81-111 

CHAPTER  V. 
Beyond  the  Color-Line  .............................  112-148 

CHAPTER  VI. 
The  "  North  Star  "  ................................  149-189 

CHAPTER  VII. 
With  the  Men  who  Abolished  Slavery  ...............  190-206 

CHAPTER   VIII. 
"  The  Man  who  is  Right  is  a  Majority"  ..............  207-229 

CHAPTER  IX. 
"  Beware  of  a  Yankee  when  he  is  Feeding  "  ..........  230-255 

(v) 


VI  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  X. 
"Is  God  Dead?" 256-283 

CHAPTER  XI. 
Union  Forever 284-311 

CHAPTER  XII. 
The  Leader  in  Politics 312-332 

CHAPTER  XIII. 
Marshal  and  Recorder 333-357 

CHAPTER  XIV. 
The  Nation's  Problem 358-392 

CHAPTER  XV. 
Conclusion % „ 393-401 

Appendix 402-407 

Index 409-424 


FREDERICK    DOUGLASS 


CHAPTER    I. 

THE     SLAVE. 

"  IT  has  been  a  source  of  great  annoyance  to  me, 
never  to  have  a  birthday,"  says  Mr.  Douglass,  in  a 
private  letter.  He  supposes  that  he  was  born  in 
February,  1817  ;  but  no  one  knows  the  day  of  his 
birth  or  his  father's  name.  Such  trifles  were  seldom 
recorded  of  slaves.  His  mother,  Harriet  Bailey,  was 
one  of  the  five  daughters  of  Isaac  and  Betsy  Bailey  ; 
and  as  slaves  were  not  often  permitted  to  own  a  sur 
name,  this  must  have  been  one  of  the  old  families  of 
Maryland.  Grandmother  Be'tty  was  especially  hon 
ored  for  her  skill  in  planting  sweet  potatoes,  as  well 
as  in  making  and  handling  nets  for  taking  shad  and 
herring.  When  we  find  further  that  the  village  where 
she  resided  still  bore  the  aboriginal  name,  Tuckahoe, 
we  may  believe  that  it  was  from  her,  that  her  grand 
son  derived  those  high  cheek  bones,  and  other 


8  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

peculiarities  of  physiognomy,  which  often  caused 
him  to  be  mistaken  for  an  Indian  in  later  life.  His 
first  master  sometimes  called  him  "  My  little  Indian 
boy,"  and  his  whole  history  shows  that  he  sprang 
from  a  race  of  warriors,  who  had  rather  die  than  be 
slaves.  His  oratorical  power  should  be  ascribed  to 
his  African  descent,  or  to  his  European  parentage. 
He  himself  attributes  his  love  of  letters  to  the  native 
genius  of  his  mother,  who  was  the  only  colored  per 
son  able  to  read  in  the  whole  village.  This  rare 
accomplishment  suggests  the  probability  that  she 
had  once  been  something  more  than  a  field  hand. 
Her  son  saw  her  so  seldom,  however,  and  lost  her  so 
early,  that  he  may  have  overestimated  her  ability,  in 
consequence  partly  of  gratitude  and  partly  of  a  pop 
ular  theory,  about  the  preponderating  influence  over 
great  men  of  gifted  mothers,  which  long  investiga 
tion  justifies  my  calling  extravagant.  Inheritance  of 
genius  has  come,  in  actual  fact,  at  least  as  much  from 
the  father  as  from  the  mother  ;  and  in  the  most  illus 
trious  instances  it  has  come  from  both  sides.  I  sus 
pect  that  there  is  some  foundation  for  the  rumor,  that 
the  father  in  this  case  was  a  noted  politician.  White 
he  undoubtedly  was,  for  the  son  was  of  much  lighter 
color  than  his  mother,  whose  "  deep  black,  glossy  " 
features,  are  said  by  him  to  have  resembled  those  of 
King  Rameses  the  Great,  on  page  157  of  "  Prichard's 
Natural  History  of  Man." 

She  called  him  Frederick  Augustus  Washington 
Bailey  ;  but  after  his  escape  he  took  the  name  which 
he  has  made  famous.  She  had  an  older  son,  Perry, 
and  four  daughters;  but  none  of  them,  I  think,  was 
endowed  with  his  peculiar  genius.  Perhaps  there 


THE    SLAVE.  9 

was  a  different  father.  Her  services  were  too  valu 
able  for  her  to  be  permitted  to  waste  her  time  on  her 
children,  and  Douglass  does  not  remember  having 
ever  seen  her  before  he  was  six  years  old. 

His  earliest  memories  are  of  his  grandmother's  log 
cabin  in  his  native  village,  Tuckahoe,  on  the  bank  of 
the  Choptank  River,  in  Talbot  County,  on  the  eastern 
shore  of  Maryland.  The  floor  and  chimney  were  of 
clay,  and  there  were  no  windows,  nor  any  bedsteads, 
except  rails  flung  over  the  cross-beams.  Food  was 
coarse,  but  it  was  abundant,  and  the  little  boy  was 
never  scolded  for  playing  in  the  dirt,  or  getting  his 
clothes  wet,  or  not  learning  his  lessons,  or  using  his 
knife  and  fork  awkwardly.  In  fact,  he  had  no  lessons, 
or  knife  and  fork,  and  scarcely  any  clothing,  to  be 
troubled  about.  Year  after  year  went  by,  during 
which  he  was  as  free  and  happy  as  the  squirrels  he 
saw  running  up  the  trees,  or  the  minnows  for  which 
he  used  to  fish  in  the  mill-pond.  His  grandmother 
was  always  kind,  and  the  only  cloud  upon  his  path 
was  the  fear  of  being  taken  from  her,  as  his  brother 
and  his  sisters  had  been.  He  dreaded  to  find 
himself  growing  taller,  and  at  last  the  terrible  day 
came. 

One  summer  morning,  before  he  was  seven,  she  took 
his  hand  in  hers,  and  led  him,  or  carried  him  on  her 
shoulder,  over  the  twelve  miles  which  lay  between 
Tuckahoe  and  the  house  of  their  master,  Captain  An 
thony.  This  man  owned  three  farms  in  Tuckahoe,  and 
about  thirty  slaves  ;  but  his  time  was  mainly  occupied 
in  managing  the  estates  of  Colonel  Lloyd,  who  had  a 
thousand  slaves  and  twenty  or  thirty  different  farms. 
All  the  overseers  were  under  the  control  of  Captain 


10  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Anthony,  whose  plain  brick  house  stood  near  the 
stately  mansion  of  Colonel  Lloyd,  on  the  latter's 
home  plantation,  on  the  banks  of  the  Wye,  which 
flows  into  Chesapeake  Bay,  about  thirty-five  miles 
southeast  of  Baltimore. 

At  the  "  great  house  "  the  Lloyds  lived  in  such  lux 
ury  as  the  little  boy  had  never  dreamed  of  ;  but  the 
suffering  outside  was  almost  indescribable.  Most  of 
the  slaves  were  driven  out  into  the  field  at  the  first 
sign  of  dawn,  with  lashes  for  those  who  came  last  ; 
and  they  were  kept  there  until  it  was  too  dark  to  work. 
The  mending  and  cooking  were  done  during  the  night, 
and  the  food  was  carried  out  to  be  eaten  in  the  field, 
where  the  babies  were  nursed,  when  the  mothers 
could  not  be  spared  time  to  go  home.  There 
was  no  public  opinion  in  Talbot  County  to  hinder 
the  worst  of  cruelties.  Our  hero  saw  his  Aunt 
Esther  receive  from  his  master,  because  he  was 
jealous  and  she  loved  another  slave,  thirty  or  forty 
stripes,  each  of  which  drew  screams  and  blood.  One 
of  his  cousins  once  walked  the  twelve  miles  from 
Tuckahoe,  to  show  how  a  drunken  overseer  had 
gashed  her  shoulders  with  his  cowhide,  and  struck 
her  such  a  blow  over  the  head  with  his  stick  as  left 
her  face  covered  with  blood.  Her  master  only  told 
her  to  tramp  back  at  once  or  he  would  take  the  rest 
of  her  skin  off  her  back  himself.  Such  floggings 
were  frequent,  and  a  slave  who  tried  to  escape  one 
by  running  into  the  creek,  was  shot  down  there  by 
the  overseer,  on  the  very  plantation  where  the  little 
Frederick  was  kept.  His  wife's  cousin,  a  girl  of 
fifteen,  was  beaten  to  death  in  her  sleep  by  her  mis 
tress  for  bein^  unable  to  hear  the  crv  of  a  baby  who 


THE    SLAVE.  II 

had  kept  her  up  night  after  night.  Murders  of  slaves 
were  frequent  on  the  Eastern  Shore,  but  there  was  no 
punishment  and  little  blame.  The  worst  sufferings 
of  the  slaves,  however,  seem  to  have  come  from  lack 
of  sleep  and  food.  The  men  and  women  were  given 
about  a  quarter  of  a  pound  of  pork,  or  a  little  fish, 
daily,  a  peck  of  coarse  corn-meal  per  week,  and 
nothing  else,  except  a  little  salt.  The  corn-cake  was 
full  of  bran,  and  covered  so  thickly,  with  ashes  that 
no  Northerner  could  eat  it.  Bed  there  was  none, 
only  a  blanket  for  each  adult.  The  children  had  no 
blanket,  nor  any  clothes,  except  a  pair  of  shirts  of  sack 
cloth  for  each  child  every  year.  Whole  flocks  of 
little  boys  and  girls,  from  five  to  ten  years  old,  might 
be  seen  running  naked  around  the  "  great  house,"  or 
huddled  together  in  the  sun  during  the  frosty  days 
of  March. 

The  little  Frederick  had  to  sleep  on  cold  nights 
with  his  head  and  shoulders  in  a  sack,  and  his  feet 
had  cracks  big  enough  to  hold  a  penholder.  His 
share  of  the  mush,  which  a  dozen  children  at  Captain 
Anthony's  ate  like  pigs  out  of  a  trough  on  the  kitchen 
floor,  was  so  scanty  that  he  was  often  pinched  with 
hunger.  He  used  to  run  to  pick  up  the  little  bones 
which  were  flung  out  for  the  cats,  and  he  often  fought 
with  the  dog  for  the  crumbs  which  fell  from  the 
kitchen  table.  The  very  taste  of  white  bread  was 
unknown  to  him  ;  but  he  was  fascinated  by  the  sight 
of  those  snowy  biscuits,  baked  in  a  quick  oven,  out 
of  unleavened  flour,  which  he  saw  carried  to  the 
Lloyd's  table,  and  he  made  up  his  mind  that  he  would 
have  some  to  eat  every  morning  when  he  was  a  man. 
This  ambition  has  been  so  far  satisfied  that  precisely 


12  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

such  biscuit  have  been  regularly  set  before  him  for 
his  Sunday  breakfast  at  Cedar  Hill. 

The  worst  of  it  was  that  the  cook,  Aunt  Katy,  often 
whipped  him  or  made  him  go  all  day  without  food, 
except  a  wretched  breakfast.  One  night,  when  he  had 
been  treated  thus  and  was  too  hungry  to  sleep,  he  man 
aged  to  steal  a  few  kernels  of  Indian  corn  and  roast 
them  in  the  fire.  Just  as  he  was  about  to  eat  them,  his 
mother  came  in  and  took  him  in  her  arms.  She  had 
walked  twelve  miles  to  see  him,  and  her  indignation, 
at  hearing  that  Aunt  Katy  threatened  to  starve  the 
life  out  of  him,  was  loud  and  fierce.  He  ate  the  large 
ginger  cake  she  gave  him,  and  felt  prouder,  as  he  sat 
on  her  knee,  than  a  king  on  his  throne.  He  soon 
dropped  off  to  sleep,  however  ;  before  he  awoke,  his 
mother  had  to  go  back  to  her  work  ;  and  he  never  saw 
her  again,  for  he  was  not  allowed  to  stand  beside  her 
dying  bed.  These  visits  had  been  rare,  for  it  could 
only  have  been  under  unusually  favorable  circum 
stances  that  she  was  able  to  travel  the  twenty-four 
miles  in  a  single  night. 

These  scenes  show  what  was  the  early  life  of 
"  Cap'n  Ant'ney  Fed,"  as  he  was  called  in  the  jargon 
of  the  plantation,  where  the  sign  of  the  possessive 
case  was  a  luxury  unknown  to  the  slaves.  He  was 
switched  into  repeating  the  Lord's  Prayer,  but  had 
no  other  religious  training,  except  the  information 
that  "  God  up  in  the  sky  "  had  made  white  men  to  be 
masters  and  black  people  to  be  slaves,  and  that  He 
knew  what  was  best  for  them  all.  The  child  could 
not  believe  that  the  slaves  were  as  well  off  as  they 
ought  to  be,  and  he  used  to  sit  and  wonder  how 
slavery  could  exist  if  God  was  good.  His  trouble 


THE    SLAVE.  13 

often  made  him  weep,  and  his  perplexity  was  increased 
by  observing  that  God  had  not  made,  by  any  means, 
slaves  of  all  the  blacks,  or  slave-holders  of  all  the 
whites.  Light  broke  in  upon  his  troubled  mind  as 
he  found  that  some  of  his  fellow-slaves  had  been 
stolen  from  homes  where  they  were  free,  and  others 
were  children  of  fathers  and  mothers  who  had  been 
thus  brought  into  bondage.  Clearly  it  was  man  who 
was  responsible,  not  God.  The  little  boy's  Aunt 
Jennie  suddenly  disappeared  with  her  husband,  and 
it  was  whispered  about  that  they  had  run  away  to  the 
free  States,  and  would  henceforth  be  free.  Before  he 
was  eight  years  old  he  made  up  his  mind  that  he 
would,  some  day,  do  what  they  did.  No  wonder,  for, 
as  he  said  in  1855,  he  became  "just  as  well  aware  of 
the  unjust,  unnatural,  and  murderous  character  of 
slavery  when  nine  years  old,  as  I  am  now." 

Among  the  few  bright  spots  in  Fred's  plantation 
life  was  the  kindness  of  his  master's  daughter,  Mrs. 
Thomas  Auld,  still  called  "  Miss  Lucretia  "  by  the 
slaves.  When  he  had  a  fight  with  another  slave-boy, 
and  came  home  roaring  with  pain,  and  streaming 
with  blood  from  a  wound  which  left  the  sign  of  the 
cross  upon  his  forehead,  it  was  she  who  washed  away 
the  blood,  put  on  balsam,  and  bound  up  the  wound. 
When  he  was  unusually  hungry  he  used  to  go  and 
sing  under  her  window,  and  she  would  give  him  a 
slice  of  bread  and  butter.  It  may  have  been  her 
intercession  which  saved  his  boyish  spirit  from  being 
crushed  into  submission  to  his  lot,  and  gave  him  the 
key  to  the  prison  door. 

In  the  summer  of  1825,  soon  after  he  had  begun  his 
ninth  year,  she  told  him  that  he  was  to  go  to  Balti- 


14  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

more,  which  seemed  like  heaven  to  the  slaves  on  the 
Eastern  Shore.  The  next  three  days  were  the  happiest 
he  had  ever  known,  and  were  spent  mainly  in  the 
creek,  where  he  was  trying  to  wash  the  dead  skin  off 
his  feet  and  knees.  "Miss  Lucretia"  had  told  him 
she  would  give  him  a  pair  of  trousers  if  he  could  get 
himself  clean.  He  had  no  home  to  regret,  and  he 
hardly  dared  to  go  to  sleep,  for  fear  he  might  be  left 
behind. 

Early  on  a  Saturday  morning  he  was  able  to  look 
for  the  last  time,  as  he  hoped,  on  the  plantation,  as 
the  sloop  carried  him  over  Chesapeake  Bay  towards 
Baltimore.  He  arrived  there  on  Sunday  morning, 
and  was  kindly  received  by  his  new  Mistress,  Mrs. 
Hugh  Auld,  sister-in-law  of  Lucretia's  husband, 
Thomas.  "  Miss  Sopha,"  as  the  boy  called  her,  gave 
him  a  comfortable  bed,  good  clothes,  and  palatable 
food,  while  he  had  nothing  harder  to  do  than  to  run 
errands  and  take  care  of  her  son,  little  Tommy.  Ail 
three  soon  grew  very  fond  of  each  other,  and  she  even 
granted  a  request,  made  under  circumstances  de 
scribed  thus,  in  a  speech  made  at  Belfast,  in  1846  : 

"  I  remember  the  first  time  I  ever  heard  the  Bible  read,  and 
from  that  time  I  trace  my  first  desire  to  learn  to  read.  I  was 
over  seven  years  old  ;  my  master  had  gone  out  one  Sunday 
night,  the  children  had  gone  to  bed.  I  had  crawled  under  the 
center  table  and  had  fallen  asleep,  when  my  mistress  com 
menced  to  read  the  Bible  aloud,  so  loud  that  she  waked  me. 
She  waked  me  to  sleep  no  more.  I  have  found  since  that  the 
chapter  she  then  read  was  the  first  of  Job.  I  remember  my 
sympathy  for  the  good  old  man,  and  my  anxiety  to  learn  more 
about  him  led  me  to  ask  my  mistress  to  teach  me  to  read." 

She  complied   gladly,  and  was  soon   looking  for- 


THE    SLAVE.  15 

ward  to  see  him  reading  the  Bible.  Her  joy  led  her 
to  tell  her  husband,  but  he  at  once  forbade  any  more 
lessons,  telling  her  that  learning  would  spoil  any 
nigger,  and  that  if  this  one  should  ever  be  taught  to 
read  the  Bible,  there  would  be  no  keeping  him  a  slave. 
This  was  said  in  Fred's  hearing,  and  it  proved  the 
best  lesson  he  ever  had.  He  heard  that  knowledge 
would  prevent  his  remaining  a  slave,  and  at  once  he 
made  up  his  mind  to  get  all  he  could.  "  Miss  Sopha  " 
not  only  taught  him  no  more,  but  would  snatch  away 
any  book  or  newspaper  she  might  see  in  his  hand, 
while  she  took  great  care  never  to  leave  him  alone 
with  anything  he  could  read.  He  turned  the  street 
into  a  school-room,  and  made  his  white  playmates  his 
teachers.  He  always  carried  Webster's  spelling-book 
in  his  pocket,  and  also  bread  enough  to  pay  the  hun 
gry  little  boys  he  met  for  giving  him  lessons.  He 
used  now  and  then  to  ask  these  white  boys  if  it  was 
right  for  him  to  be  a  slave,  and  they  always  agreed 
with  him  that  it  was  not.  Finding  them  interested  in 
the  "  Columbian  Orator,"  he  bought  a  copy  with  fifty 
cents,  earned  by  blacking  boots  in  the  street.  Here 
he  found  a  dialogue  between  a  runaway  slave,  just 
recaptured,  and  his  master.  The  negro  demonstrated 
the  injustice  of  slavery  with  such  power  that  he  was 
emancipated.  Think  how  eagerly  this  was  read  by 
the  boy  of  thirteen!  He  entered  with  equal  zeal  into 
the  denunciations  of  oppression  by  great  orators,  and 
especially  by  Sheridan  in  his  demand  for  Catholic 
emancipation.  The  speeches  of  Chatham  and  Fox, 
too,  in  behalf  of  America,  helped  him  to  understand 
the  rights  of  man.  He  was  all  ears  when  he  heard 
any  one  speak  of  slavery,  and  the  heat  which  his 


l6  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

master  and  other  white  men  showed  against  Abolition 
ists,  made  him  very  curious  to  know  who  they  were. 
Evidently  they  had  something  to  do  with  slavery,  but 
what  could  it  be  ?  At  last  he  found  out  from  one  of 
the  city  newspapers,  probably  in  February,  1833, 
when  there  was  much  agitation,  that  they  had  been 
sending  petitions  to  Congress,  asking  for  the  abolition 
of  the  slave  trade  between  States,  as  well  as  of  slavery 
itself  in  the  District  of  Columbia.  Thenceforth  he 
knew  that  he  was  not  without  friends  upon  the  earth. 
This  idea  assumed  a  practicable  form,  when  an  Irish 
man  repaid  him,  for  helping  to  unload  a  boat  full  of 
stones,  by  telling  him  that  he  need  only  go  North  to 
be  as  free  as  anybody. 

His  confidence  that  he  would  finally  gain  both 
freedom  and  knowledge  was  much  increased  by  an 
interest  in  religion,  which  became  very  strong  before 
he  was  fourteen.  At  this  time  he  used  to  pick  up 
stray  pages  of  the  Bible  in  the  gutter,  and  wash  and 
dry  them,  in  order  to  pore  over  them  in  secret.  His 
leisure  was  now  mostly  spent  either  in  attending 
prayer-meetings,  or  in  holding  private  worship  with 
a  good  old  colored  man,  who  prayed  almost  without 
ceasing,  even  when  on  his  dray.  The  boy  taught  the 
old  man  how  to  make  out  the  hard  words,  and,  in 
return  was  shown  something  of  their  meaning.  Both 
felt  sure  that  the  Lord  would  call  Frederick  in  due 
time  to  preach  the  Gospel ;  and  the  exhortation  "  to 
wait  in  trust  and  patience  until  the  good  time  came," 
may  have  done  much  to  keep  him  from  making  a 
premature  attempt  to  escape.  His  master  tried  in 
vain  to  break  up  the  intimacy  by  threats  of  the  lash. 
The  young  church-member  resented  bitterly  the 


THE    SLAVE.  17 

persecution,  as  he  called  it  ;  and  when  the  cholera 
smote  Baltimore,  in  1833,  he  thought  that  the  Lord 
was  punishing  the  whites  for  holding  his  people  in 
bondage. 

One  reason  that  Frederick  did  not  run  away  then, 
was  that  he  wished  first  to  learn  how  to  write  a  pass  for 
himself.  He  had  now  exchanged  his  easy  life,  of 
waiting  on  "Miss  Sopha "  and  little  Tommy,  for 
regular  work  in  Mr.  Auld's  ship-yard.  He  noticed 
that  the  carpenters  marked  each  piece  of  timber  with 
a  capital  letter,  S.  L.  A.  or  F. ;  and  he  soon  found 
that  these  were  the  initials  of  the  words  "  Star 
board,"  "  Larboard,"  "  Aft,"  and  "  Forward."  While 
the  men  were  at  dinner,  he  taught  himself  to  make 
these  four  letters.  Then  he  challenged  the  white 
boys  to  "  beat  that,"  and  thus  made  them  show  him 
other  letters.  Thus  he  u  learned  to  write  on  board 
fences,  making  some  of  his  early  capitals  with  their 
heads  downwards  and  looking  the  wrong  way."  By 
and  by  he  managed  to  copy  the  italics  out  of  the 
spelling-book.  He  even  ventured,  at  great  risk  of  a 
flogging,  to  take  the  old  writing-books  which  Master 
Tommy  had  brought  home  from  school,  and  copy  off 
line  after  line  in  the  vacant  spaces.  He  secretly 
carried  a  flour  barrel  and  a  chair  into  the  kitchen  loft, 
where  he  slept,  and  there  he  used  to  work  late  into 
the  night,  copying  from  the  Bible  and  the  Methodist 
hymn-book. 

While  the  young  slave  was  preparing  himself  for 
freedom,  he  became,  in  consequence  of  the  death  of 
"  Miss  Lucretia  "  and  her  father,  the  property  of  her 
husband,  Captain  Thomas  Auld.  His  new  master 
soon  quarreled  with  his  brother  in  Baltimore,  and 


l8  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

took  his  chattel  away.  This  was  in  March,  1833, 
when  Captain  Auld  had  taken  up  his  residence  at  St. 
Michael's,  a  fishing  village  on  the  Bay,  about  forty 
miles  from  Baltimore.  He  had  taken  a  second  wife  ; 
and  her  father,  a  rich  slave-holder  named  Hamilton, 
lived  a  few  miles  away.  The  kitchen  at  St.  Michael's 
was  not  very  bountifully  supplied  ;  and  the  appetite 
of  the  growing  boy  was  keen  enough  to  tempt  him  to 
theft. 

Whatever  scruples  the  young  aspirant  for  the 
ministry  felt,  were  quieted  by  this  ingenious  argu 
ment.  Captain  Auld's  meat  continued  to  be  his, 
after  it  was  taken  out  of  one  of  his  tubs  and  put  into 
another  ;  so  there  really  was  no  stealing.  As  for  the 
neighbors,  they  were  accomplices  in  deliberately  rob 
bing  the  laborer  of  his  reward,  and  he  was  justified 
in  protecting  himself  against  starvation  at  their 
expense.  Another  way  in  which  he  used  to  supply 
himself  with  food  was  letting  loose  his  master's 
horse.  The  animal  would  always  dash  off  to  its 
former  stable,  on  the  Hamilton  plantation,  five  miles 
off.  The  groom  would  have  to  be  sent  to  bring  him 
back,  and  he  would  return  with  bread  enough  to 
make  him  comfortable  for  a  day  or  two.  He  gave 
additional  offence  by  constantly  speaking  to  Mr. 
Auld,  or  of  him  to  Mrs.  Auld,  by  his  old  title,  "Cap 
tain,"  and  not  saying  "  Master,"  as  was  desired  by 
the  wife  especially.  Of  course,  this  led  to  frequent 
whippings. 

Mrs.  Auld  was  a  devout  member  of  the  church,  and 
Thomas  became  one  at  a  camp-meeting  that  August ; 
but  Frederick's  new  brother  disappointed  all  his 
hopes  of  better  treatment  than  before.  He  ventured, 


THE    SLAVE.  19 

soon  after  the  conversion,  to  help  teach  a  little  Sun 
day-school.  A  dozen  old  spelling-books  and  a  few 
Testaments  were  collected.  Twenty  children  came 
together  the  first  day,  and  the  young  teacher  thought 
he  had  now  found  something  worth  living  for. 
Scarcely  had  school  begun  on  the  second  Sunday, 
however,  when  in  rushed  a  rnob,  headed  by  Master 
Thomas  and  two  Methodist  class-leaders.  The 
scholars  were  driven  away  with  sticks  and  stones,  and 
forbidden  ever  to  meet  again,  for  they  were  black. 
Frederick  was  told  that  he  wanted  to  be  like  Nat 
Turner,  who  led  a  bloody  insurrection  in  South 
ampton,  Va.,  1831,  and  that  he  would  get  as  many 
balls  in  his  body  as  Nat  had,  if  he  did  not  look  out. 
He  had  seen  slave  girls  treated  with  unusual  cruelty 
by  a  pious  mistress  in  Baltimore,  and  he  was  soon  to 
have  new  proof  of  how  little  could  be  done,  even  by 
religion,  to  lessen  the  essential  wickedness  of  slavery. 
The  completion  of  his  industrial  education  was 
intrusted  by  Brother  Auld  to  Brother  Covey,  a  devout 
neighbor,  famous  for  success  in  breaking  unruly 
slaves.  The  morning  of  the  first  of  January,  1834, 
found  the  poor  boy  trudging  along,  with  his  little 
bundle  at  the  end  of  his  stick,  to  the  new  master 
with  whom  that  year  must  be  spent.  Covey,  too, 
was  a  Methodist,  and  made  his  slaves  hear  a  great 
deal  of  religious  talk  on  Sunday,  as  well  as  a  short 
prayer  every  morning  and  a  long  prayer  every  night. 
Frederick  was  depended  upon  to  lead  the  singing, 
but  he  often  failed  to  do  so  ;  for  such  worship  seemed 
to  him  a  mockery.  He  was  no  longer  starved,  but  he 
was  overworked  systematically,  and  often  kept  in  the 
field  until  almost  midnight.  It  was  never  too  hot  or 


20  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

too  cold  for  out-door  work — it  could  never  rain,  blow, 
snow,  or  hail  too  hard.  The  longest  days  were  too 
short,  he  says,  for  his  master,  and  the  shortest  nights 
were  too  long.  Covey  relied  mainly  on  hard  work 
for  breaking  slaves.  When  he  chose  to  set  them  an 
example,  he  would  "make  everything  fly  before  him." 
He  was  an  experienced  overseer,  and  had  peculiar 
skill  in  watching  his  slaves,  when  they  thought  him 
far  away,  and  creeping  out  upon  them  unexpectedly. 
They  spoke  of  him  to  each  other  as  "  the  snake,"  and 
felt. as  if  .they  were  always  under  his  cruel  eye. 

The  lash  was  only  a  secondary  feature  of  his  plan  ; 
but  it  was  not  left  out.  Frederick  had  been  with  him 
but  three  days  when  he  was  sent,  on  one  of  the 
coldest  mornings  of  January,  with  a  pair  of  oxen,  to 
bring  in  wood  from  the  forest.  He  had  never  driven 
oxen  before,  and  these  were  scarcely  broken  in. 
Covey  himself  would  not  have  dared  to  take  them 
into  the  woods,  until  he  had  let  them  work  off  some 
of  their  wildness  in  the  open  field.  The  young 
driver  was  told  to  go  to  the  woods  ;  and  thither  he 
went,  \vithout  daring  to  make  objections.  The  oxen 
ran  all  the  way  over  the  fields,  pulling  him  along  at 
the  end  of  the  rope  with  which  he  was  ordered  to 
keep  them  from  running  away.  When  they  got  in 
among  the  trees,  they  took  fright,  and  rushed  about 
wildly,  so  that  he  expected  to  be  dashed  to  death. 
At  last  they  stopped,  entangled  in  sapplings,  and 
with  the  body  of  the  cart,  the  wheels,  and  the  tongue 
lying  scattered  about.  It  took  hard  work  to  get  the 
pieces  together  and  release  the  oxen.  On  their  way 
out  of  the  wood  they  ran  away  once  more,  despite  a 
heavy  load,  broke  the  gate  into  splinters,  and  nearly. 


THE    SLAVE.  21 

crushed  the  driver  between  the  wheel  and  the  post. 
It  was  noon  when  he  reached  the  house,  but  he  was 
sent  back  at  once  with  the  cart  to  the  woods.  Covey 
followed,  overtook  him  there,  and  said  he  would 
teach  him  how  to  waste  time  and  break  gates.  He 
cut  from  a  black  gum-tree  three  young  shoots,  from 
four  to  six  feet  long,  such  as  are  used  for  ox-goads. 
Then  he  commanded  the  slave  to  take  off  his  clothes. 
No  heed  was  given  to  the  order  ;  Covey  tore  them  off 
himself.  The  tough  goads  were  worn  out,  one  by 
one,  and  such  sores  were  left  on  the  back  as  kept 
open,  under  the  coarse  shirt,  for  weeks.  This  was 
the  first  instance  of  what  happened  every  few  days 
for  six  months. 

Douglass  says  it  was  then,  if  at  any  one  time,  more 
than  another,  that  he  was  "  made  to  drink  the  bitterest 
dregs  of  slavery."  "A  few  months  of  this  discipline 
tamed  me."  ..."  I  was  broken  in  body,  soul  and  spirit." 
..."  My  natural  elasticity  was  crushed  ;  my  intellect 
languished  ;  the  disposition  to  read  departed  ;  the 
dark  night  of  slavery  closed  in  upon  me  ;  and  behold 
a  man  transformed  into  a  brute  !"..."!  had  neither 
sufficient  time  in  which  to  eat  or  sleep,  except  on 
Sunday."  ..."  I  spent  this  in  a  sort  of  beast-like  stupor, 
between  sleeping  and  waking  under  some  large 
tree."  ..."  I  v/as  sometimes  prompted  to  take  my 
life,  and  that  of  Covey,  but  was  prevented  by  a  com 
bination  of  hope  and  fear."  .  .  .  "  Thp  over-work, 
and  the  brutal  chastisement,  combined  with  that  ever- 
gnawing  and  soul-devouring  thought,  '  I  am  a  slave — 
a  slave  for  life — a  slave  with  no  rational  ground  to 
hope  for  freedom,'  rendered  me  a  living  embodiment 
of  mental  and  physical  wretchedness." 


22  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

On  one  of  the  hottest  Friday  afternoons  in  August 
Covey  was  thrashing  out  his  wheat  in  barbaric 
fashion.  Horses  were  treading  it  loose  from  the 
straw  ;  and  Frederick  was  carrying  the  mixture  of 
wheat,  chaff  and  dirt  to  the  fan.  He  was  in  a  hurry, 
for  he  was  to  have  time  to  go  fishing,  if  the  work  was 
finished  before  sunset.  About  three  o'clock  he  broke 
down,  with  no  strength  left,  an  extreme  dizziness, 
and  a  violent  headache.  The  fanning  had  to  stop, 
for  every  hand  was  needed  for  the  work.  Covey 
found  him  lying  by  the  fence,  and,  with  a  savage 
kick  in  the  side,  bade  him  rise.  He  tried  to,  but  fell 
back.  Another  heavy  kick  brought  him  to  his  feet ; 
but  as  soon  as  he  stooped  to  pick  up  the  tub  in  which 
he  had  been  carrying  food  for  the  fan,  he  fell  to  the 
ground,  utterly  helpless.  Then  Brother  Covey  took 
up  the  hickory  club  with  which  the  wheat  had  been 
struck  off  level  with  the  sides  of  the  measure,  and 
gave  him  such  a  wound  on  the  head  as  made  blood 
run  freely,  saying,  "  If  you  have  got  the  headache,  I'll 
cure  you."  He  was  still  unable  to  rise,  and  was  left 
bleeding  by  the  fence. 

His  head  was  soon  relieved  by  the  flow  of  blood  ; 
and  he  resolved  to  go  and  complain  to  Captain  Auld. 
He  started  up  while  Covey  was  looking  another  way, 
and  gained  the  woods.  There  he  had  to  lie  down,  for 
his  strength  failed  him.  At  last  the  bleeding  ceased, 
and  he  made  his  way  barefoot,  through  bogs  and 
briars,  to  St.  Michael's.  It  took  him  five  hours  to 
make  the  seven  or  eight  miles  ;  and  Auld  insisted  on  his 
going  back  again  to  the  good,  religious  man.  He  did 
so  the  next  morning,  and  before  the  house  he  met 
Covey,  with  rope  and  cow-hide,  ready  for  him.  He 


THE    SLAVE.  23 

had  but  just  time  to  get  through  the  corn  into  the 
woods.  There  he  lay  down  exhausted,  for  he  had  lost 
much  blood  and  eaten  nothing  since  noon  the  day 
before.  All  day  he  lay  unpursued,  for  it  was  hoped 
that  hunger  would  bring  him  back.  His  recent  ex 
periences  with  members  of  his  church  made  prayer 
seem  useless.  There  he  lay  all  day  in  pain  and  despair. 
During  the  night  another  slave  came  by,  on  his  way 
to  spend  Sunday  with  his  wife.  The  good  couple  fed 
and  sheltered  the  sufferer,  at  the  risk  of  being  treated 
in  the  same  way.  Sandy,  as  his  benefactor  was 
named,  advised  him  not  to  attempt  an  escape,  which 
would  then  have  been  very  difficult,  but  to  trust  to 
the  magic  power  of  a  root,  whose  wearer  ran  no 
danger  of  being  whipped  by  any  white  man.  The 
incredulous  listener  wras  reminded  that  all  his  book 
learning  had  not  protected  him.  Sunday  morning 
found  him  with  his  pocket  full  of  roots  in  front  of 
Covey's  house.  He  was  kindly  received,  for  the  good 
man  was  about  to  go  to  church.  While  regaining  his 
strength,  he  resolved  upon  a  course  worthy  of  his 
white  as  well  as  of  his  Indian  blood.  He  knew  that 
those  slaves  who  could  be  whipped  easiest  were 
whipped  oftenest  ;  and  he  felt  that  he  had  listened 
too  blindly  to  sermons  in  which  non-resistance  was 
ejrjoined  as  the  peculiar  virtue  of  the  colored  race. 
"My  hands,"  he  says,  "were  no  longer  tied  by  my 
religion."  He  had  made  up  his  mind  to  risk  being 
sold  South,  or  incurring  the  penalty  of  the  State  law, 
which  provided  that  any  slave  who  resisted  his 
master  should  be  hung,  and  then  have  his  head  cut 
of!  and  set  up,  with  the  tour  quarters  of  his  body,  in 
prominent  places. 


24  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Long  before  daylight  the  next  morning  he  was  called 
out  and  sent  to  feed  the  horses.  As  he  was  going  up  to 
the  loft  in  the  stable,  Covey  sneaked  in  behind  and 
tried  to  slip  a  rope  around  his  leg,  in  order  to  tie  him 
up  for  a  flogging.  He  fell  heavily,  but  leaped  up  at 
once  and  sprang  at  his  master's  throat.  There  the 
strong  black  fingers  kept  their  grasp  until  the  nails 
drew  blood.  The  white  man  tried  to  strike  ;  but 
every  blow  was  parried,  though  none  was  struck  in 
return.  He  closed  with  the  slave,  but  went  down 
again  and  again  upon  the  floor.  "  Are  you  going  to 
resist,  you  scoundrel  ?  "  "  Yes,  sir,"  was  the  steady 
answer.  Covey  called  his  cousin  to  his  assistance  ; 
but  the  white  boy  was  at  once  doubled  up  with  pain 
by  the  black  boy's  kick.  "  Are  you  going  to  keep 
this  up?"  "  Yes,  indeed,  come  what  may.  You  have 
treated  me  like  a  brute  the  last  six  months,  and  I 
shall  stand  it  no  longer."  Covey  dragged  him  out  of 
the  stable  to  a  stick  of  wood,  with  which  he  meant  to 
knock  him  down.  Just  as  he  stooped  to  pick  it  up, 
he  was  seized  by  the  black  hands  and  flung  out  his 
full  length  into  the  cow-yard.  Another  slave  now 
came  up,  and  was  commanded  to  take  hold  of  the 
rebel.  He  at  first  pretended  not  to  understand  the 
order,  and  finally  said,  "  My  master  hired  me  here  to 
work,  and  not  to  help  you  whip  Frederick."  This  man's 
owner  would  not  let  him  be  flogged  unless  he  de 
served  it  ;  and  the  two  were  left  to  fight  it  out.  The 
only  slave  whom  Covey  owned  was  a  woman  who  had 
been  avowedly  bought  for  breeding.  She,  too,  was 
called  upon  for  aid  as  she  came  in  to  milk  the  cows  ; 
and  she,  too,  refused,  though  she  knew  she  must 
suffer  for  it.  For  two  hours  the  fight  had  gone  on, 


THE    SLAVE.  25 

and  Covey  had  not  been  able  to  draw  a  single  drop 
of  blood,  while  blood  had  been  drawn  from  him.  He 
had  not  been  able  to  whip  the  slave  ;  but  at  last  he 
said,  "  Now,  go  to  your  work  ;  I  should  not  have 
whipped  you  half  so  much,  if  you  had  not  resisted." 
He  never  tried  it  again,  although  he  had  plenty  of 
opportunity,  and  even  provocation,  during  the  next 
six  months. 

Douglass  is  right  in  Calling  this  the  turning  pnint  in 

his  life  as  a  slave.  It  made  him  a  man  instead_of  a 
timid  boy,  "a  frej2manj_j]^^  a 

slave  in  form."  lie  was  four  years  more  in  bondage, 
but  he  was  never  again  .whipped.  It  was  several 
times  attempted,  but  without  success.  Not  the 
slightest  punishment  was  inflicted  for  his  resisting 
Covey.  The  latter  probably  kept  his  defeat  as  much 
of  a  secret  as  possible,  lest  his  reputation  as  a  slave- 
breaker  should  be  forfeited.  Captain  Auld  may  have 
felt  even  then  what  he  acknowledged  forty  years 
afterwards,  on  his  death-bed,  to  his  visitor,  then  Mar 
shal  Douglass,  that  he  always  thought  him  too  smart 
to  be  a  slave. 

At  all  events  he  was  hired  out,  for  the  two  years 
after  that  with  Brother  Covey,  1835  an^  1836,  to  a 
neighbor  who  seldom  whipped  his  slaves,  and  always 
gave  them  plenty  of  time  to  sleep  and  eat,  while  the 
supply  of  food  was  never  stinted.  Mr.  Freeland  did 
not  profess  religion,  but  he  was  a  much  better  master 
than  the  church-members  just  mentioned,  or  two 
ministers  in  Talbot  County,  about  whom  a  good  deal 
is  said  in  *'  My  Bondage  and  My  Freedom."  The 
author  had  reason  to  think  that  the  religion  of  slave 
holders  often  put  their  consciences  to  sleep.  He  did 


26  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS 

not,  however,  give  up  all  idea  of  preaching  some  day 
himself,  and  he  used,  when  every  one  else  slept,  to 
try  to  prepare  for  the  pulpit  by  going  out  to  the  pigs 
and  talking  to  them  as  "  Dear  Brethren."  It  was 
much  more  proper  for  him  to  say  so  to  pigs  than  to 
white  men,  according  to  the  laws  of  the  land,  and  the 
opinions  most  revered  throughout  the  United  States. 
He  was  only  a  field-hand,  and  reading  matter  was 
more  out  of  reach  than  in  Baltimore.  He  did,  how 
ever,  manage  to  re-open  his  Sunday-school,  and  this 
time  it  escaped  attack,  although  it  numbered  more 
than  forty  scholars.  Many  learned  to  read,  either 
there  or  during  the  three  evenings  a  week  which  were 
devoted  to  this  work  in  winter ;  and  the  teacher 
afterward  met  several  of  his  former  pupils  as  freemen. 
This  employment  made  the  first  year  pass  pleas 
antly,  but  early  in  1836,  the  position  of  a  slave,  even 
in  this  mild  form,  began  to  seem  intolerable  to  the 
young  agitator  ;  and  the  ideas  which  he  had  learned 
from  the  "  Columbian  Orator,"  in  Baltimore,  were 
earnestly  set  forth  to  his  companions.  Two  of  the 
slaves  who  labored  beside  him  were  fully  aroused  by 
his  passionate  declamations  on  the  rights  of  man  and 
the  glories  of  liberty.  Two  other  young  men  on  the 
plantation  of  his  owner's  father-in-law,  Mr.  Hamil 
ton,  joined  them.  All  agreed  to  set  at  naught  the 
teachings  of  the  pulpit,  and  the  dangers  which 
threatened  fugitives.  The  conspirators  held  frequent 
meetings,  and  kept  up  each  other's  zeal  by  songs 
with  a  secret  meaning,  like 

"  I  am  bound  for  the  land  of  Canaan, 
I  don't  expect  to  stay  much  longer  here,"  etc. 


THE    SLAVE.  27 

According  to  the  plan  invented   by  our  hero,  they 
were   going  to  take  a  large  canoe,  belonging  to  Mr. 
Hamilton,  sail  and   paddle   to  the   head   of  the  bay, 
seventy  miles  off,  and  then  make  their  way  on  foot  to 
the  North.     The  only  free  city  known  to  them,*even 
by  name,  was  New  York.     The  leader  had   written 
passes  permitting   the   bearers  to  spend  the   Easter 
holidays  in   Baltimore,  and   they  were  getting  ready 
to  start    on    the    Saturday  evening  previous.       That 
morning,  just  as  Frederick   had   been   called  in  from 
the  field  for  breakfast,  he  saw  Mr.    Hamilton  gallop 
up  to  the  house  ;  three  other  white  men  followed  on 
horseback  ;  and  after  them  walked  two  negroes  whose 
hands  were  tied.     He  saw  that  he  was  betrayed  and 
that  his  best  plan  was  to  submit,  quietly.     One  of  Mr. 
Freeland's  slaves  followed  his  example,  but  the  other 
fought  bravely,  though   pistols  were  pointed  against 
his  heart.     The  scuffle   gave  the  writer  of  the  passes 
a  chance  to  burn  his  own  unobserved,  and  the  others 
were  eaten,  by  his  advice,  as  the  slaves  were  dragged 
along   the   road    by    the    mounted    constables.      Mr. 
Freeland's  mother  had  supplied  the  slaves  whom  he 
owned  with  food,  while  she  scolded  the  "  long-legged 
yellow  devil,"  who  had  made  them  think  of  running 
away.     They  stopped    during    the    tramp    of   fifteen 
miles  at  his  master's   store,  and  there,  as  the  leader 
directed,  they  all  protested    that   they  had   not  the 
slightest  intention  of  absconding,  and  asked   indig 
nantly  what  evidence   there  was  against   them.     At 
last   they  reached   Easton,  the   county  seat,  and  were 
locked  up  in   the  jail.     They  could   expect  nothing 
better  than  to  be  sold  to  die  in  the  rice  swamps.     Mr. 
Freeland    and    Mr.    Hamilton    had    the    slaves    they 


28  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

owned  released,  however,  after  the  holidays  were 
over,  and  took  them  back.  The  ring-leader  was  left 
behind.  Captain  Auld  would  have  let  him  work  out 
the  year  with  Mr.  Freeland,  but  Hamilton  declared 
thaH*  he  would  shoot  the  dangerous  fellow  if  he 
appeared  again  in  that  neighborhood.  He  was  the 
only  slave  there  who  could  read  and  write.  Large 
sums  were  offered  by  the  negro-traders,  but  Auld 
declared  that  money  would  not  tempt  him  to  sell 
Frederick  South.  Finally  he  was  sent  to  Baltimore 
to  learn  a  trade,  and  promised  that,  if  he  would 
behave  himself,  he  should  be  emancipated  at  twenty- 
five.  He  had  resisted  his  master  with  success,  he  had 
taken  the  lead  in  a  plot  to  run  away,  and  his  courage 
did  not  go  without  its  reward. 

Three  years  previous  he  had  left  Baltimore  an 
unruly  boy.  He  came  back  a  strong  man,  resolved 
to  protect  himself  against  injury,  and  to  use  the  first 
good  opportunity  for  setting  himself  free.  During 
the  rest  of  1836  he  worked  as  apprentice  in  a  large 
ship-yard,  where  he  was  at  the  beck  and  call  of  seventy- 
five  carpenters.  These  white  men,  just  before  he 
entered  the  yard,  had  been  led  by  fear  of  lower  wages 
to  refuse  to  let  colored  carpenters  work  there  any 
longer  ;  and  now  they  encouraged  the  white  appren 
tices  to  pick  quarrels  with  the  new  nigger.  In  one 
of  these  he  would  have  lost  his  life  if  he  had  not  suc 
ceeded  in  parrying  a  blow  from  an  adze.  Another 
time  he  flung  the  man  who  struck  him  into  the  dock. 
Whenever  he  was  struck  he  struck  back  again,  and 
thus  he  held  his  own  for  about  eight  months.  At 
last,  the  man  who  had  been  ducked  came  at  him  with 
three  other  apprentices.  One  was  in  front,  armed 


THE    SLAVE.  29 

with  a  brick,  one  on  each  side,  and  the  fourth  behind 
with  a  heavy  hand-spike.  They  closed  in  upon  him. 
He  defended  himself,  but  a  blow  from  the  hand-spike 
stunned  him  and  brought  him  to  the  ground.  Then 
all  four  fell  upon  him  with  their  fists,  while  the  car 
penters  shouted  :  "  Kill  the  d d  nigger !  He 

struck  a  white  man  !  "  By  and  bye  he  came  to  him 
self  and  rose  to  his  hands  and  knees.  As  he  did  so  he 
got  a  kick  in  the  left  eye  which  closed  it  completely. 
Then  they  left  him,  but  even  then  he  would  have  run 
after  them  with  the  hand-spike  if  the  carpenters  had 
not  interfered. 

This  scene  deserves  attention,  on  account  of  his 
dauntless  courage,  'i  he  worst  QjLvLis.,  that  he  ronlH 
get  no  protection  from  the  Law.  He  had  been  put 
once  more  under  the  charge  of  his  master's  brother, 
Hugh  Auld  ;  but  when  this  gentleman  applied  for  a 
warrant,  the  magistrate  refused  to  issue  one,  unless 
white  witnesses  would  come  forward.  Neither  the 
word  of  the  colored  man,  nor  the  sight  of  his  wounds, 
was  of  the  slightest  importance.  The  laws  of  Mary 
land  were  for  the  protection  of  whites.  All  that  Mr. 
Auld  could  do  for  the  slave  was  to  take  him,  as  soon 
as  his  wounds  had  healed,  into  the  yard  where  he  was 
foreman.  There  the  apprentice  became  an  expert 
calker,  and  was  able,  before  the  end  of  1837,  to  earn 
a  dollar  and  a  half  a  day,  the  highest  wages  paid  to 
men  of  that  trade  in  Baltimore.  He  was  allowed  to  get 
a  job  where  he  could,  and  to  collect  the  money  ;  but 
he  had  to  hand  over  every  cent  he  received.  He  saw 
more  plainly  than  before  that  slaves  were  not  pro 
tected,  but  plundered. 

His  literary  education  had  stood  still  while  he  was 


30  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

away  from  Baltimore  ;  but  now  he  met  colored  people 
who  knew  more  than  he  did.  Some  of  them  were 
able  to  teach  him  geography  and  arithmetic.  The 
young  freedmen  even  permitted  him  to  enter  a  club 
from  which  other  slaves  were  excluded,  "  The  East 
Baltimore  Mutual  Improvement  Society  ; "  and  he 
took  a  prominent  part  in  its  debates.  He  also,  in  all 
probability,  spoke  often  in  religious  meetings  ;  and 
among  his  delighted  hearers  may  be  supposed  to 
have  been  Anna  Murray,  a  free  woman  of  color,  who 
afterward  became  his  wife. 

As  his  condition  and  prospects  improved,  his  desire 
for  freedom  grew  still  stronger  ;  and  he  longed  to 
have  money  enough  of  his  own  to  be  able  to  escape. 
In  May,  1838,  he  persuaded  Hugh  Auld  to  let  him 
hire  his  time.  He  had  to  buy  his  tools  and  clothes, 
pay  his  board,  and  hand  over  three  dollars  a  week, 
whether  work  was  good  or  bad.  He  succeeded  in 
carrying  out  the  bargain  and  in  laying  aside  some 
money.  One  Saturday  evening  in  August,  instead  of 
going  to  Mr.  Auld  with  the  sum  due,  he  went  off 
with  a  party  of  friends  to  camp-meeting,  and  did  not 
return  before  Sunday  night.  The  privilege  of  hiring 
out  was  taken  away,  in  punishment  ;  and  his  indig 
nation  led  him  to  spend  the  next  week  in  idleness. 
On  Saturday  night  there  was  a  violent  quarrel  in 
consequence  of  his  having  no  money  to  hand  over  ; 
but,  fortunately  for  him,  they  did  not  get  to  blows. 
The  next  day  he  made  up  his  mind  to  go  to  work 
early  Monday  morning,  to  make  Master  Hugh  as 
well  satisfied  as  possible  with  him  during  that  week, 
and  the  two  following,  and  then  to  run  away. 

His   success  will    be   related  in  the   next  chapter. 


THE    SLAVE.  31 

Thus  far  \ve  have  seen  him  become  familiar  with  some 
of  the  best,  as  well  as  the  worst,  aspects  of  slavery. 
He  had  been  a  half-starved  boy,  running  wild  on  a 
plantation,  a  petted  house-servant,  a  field-hand,  first 
under  a  master  who  fed  him  so  poorly  that  he  was 
obliged  to  steal,  then  under  a  professional  negro- 
breaker,  who  over-worked  him  systematically,  and 
whipped  him  cruelly,  until  he  saved  himself  from 
more  torture  by  making  a  resistance  which  might 
have  brought  him  to  the  gallows.  The  result  was  his 
coming  under  a  master  who  gave  him  plenty  of  food 
and  rest,  and  never  struck  him.  His  attempt  to 
escape,  in  company  with  other  slaves,  whom  he  had 
induced  to  join  him,  sent  him  back  to  Baltimore, 
where  he  was  cruelly  treated  at  first,  but  was  soon 
able  to  learn  a  good  trade  and  to  support  himself  in 
almost  complete  liberty.  He  had  worked  his  way 
upward  by  his  own  strength  and  courage,  going 
through  fight  after  fight,  with  his  life  in  his  hand. 
He  had  taught  himself  not  only  to  read  and  write, 
but  to  speak  effectively.  He  knew  what  to  say  about 
slavery,  and  how  to  say  it.  The  principal  thing 
which  he  needed  to  do  in  order  to  reach  the  platform 
was  to  break  his  chain. 


CHAPTER    II. 

THE     FUGITIVE. 

IT  was  on  Monday,  September  3,  1838,  that  the 
great  purpose,  which  had  been  cherished  for  more 
than  a  dozen  years,  amid  many  changes  in  place  and 
fortune,  was  carried  out  with  complete  success.  It 
was  many  years  before  the  fugitive  told  how  he 
escaped.  He  was  often  tempted  to  give  this  addi 
tional  charm  to  his  lectures  and  editorials,  but  he 
would  not  resort  to  this  easy  way  of  conquering 
those  slanderers  who  said  that  he  had  never  been  a 
slave.  He  kept  his  lips  firmly  shut,  partly  because 
he  meant  to  save  those  who  had  assisted  him  from 
punishment,  and  partly  because  he  was  determined 
to  have  this  path  to  freedom  remain  open  to  his 
brothers  and  sisters  still  in  bondage.  He  knew  that 
if  no  accounts  of  the  escape  of  a  slave  who  let  him 
self  be  nailed  up  in  a  box,  and  sent  North  by  rail,' 
had  been  published,  there  might  have  been  a  thous 
and  "  Box  Browns  "  a  year.  Such  secrets  were  often 
printed,  and  it  was  not  the  slave  who  read  them,  but 
the  master.  Fortunately  there  was,  at  least,  one 
enemy  of  slavery  who  was  wise  enough  to  fight  her 
with  silence  as  well  as  speech.  His  secret  was  not 
told  in  print  before  1872. 

His   plan   was,  in  the  first  place,  as  already   men- 
32 


THE    FUGITIVE.  33 

tioned,  to  work  for  three  weeks  so  diligently  and 
profitably  as  to  avert  all  suspicion.  He  succeeded  so 
well  that,  on  the  second  Saturday  night,  he  paid  over, 
as  the  result  of  that  week's  work,  nine  dollars  to  his 
master.  The  latter  was  so  delighted  that  he  actually 
presented  him  with  the  generous  sum  of  twenty-five 
cents,  bidding  him  make  a  good  use  of  it.  We  shall 
see  that  he  did.  He  had  already  saved  up  seventeen 
dollars,  and  by  the  end  of  the  third  week  all  his  pre 
parations  were  made.  The  laws  of  Maryland  required 
every  free  negro  to  carry  papers  describing  him 
accurately  and  to  pay  liberally  for  this  protection. 
Slaves  often  escaped  by  borrowing  papers  from  a 
friend,  to  whom  the  precious  documents  would  be 
returned  by  mail.  Whenever  a  colored  man  came 
with  free  papers  to  the  railroad  station  to  buy  a 
ticket,  he  was  always  examined  carefully  enough  to 
insure  the  detection  of  a  runaway,  unless  the  resemb 
lance  was  very  close.  Our  hero  was  not  acquainted 
with  any  free  negro  who  looked  much  like  him  ;  but 
he  found  out  that  passengers  who  paid  on  the  cars 
were  not  scrutinized  so  minutely  as  those  who  bought 
tickets,  and  also  that  sailors  were  treated  with  pecu 
liar  indulgence  by  the  conductors.  The  dominant 
party  was  doing  all  it  could  to  encourage  the  shipping 
interest,  and  rapidly  reducing  the  tariff.  The  cry  of 
"Free  Trade  and  Sailors'  Rights"  meant  in  this  in 
stance  "  Free  Labor  and  the  Rights  of  the  Slave." 

Among  his  friends  was  a  sailor  who  was  of  much 
darker  hue  than  he  was  himself,  but  who  owned  a 
protection,  setting  forth  his  occupation,  and  bearing 
the  sacred  figure  of  the  American  eagle.  This  was 
borrowed  ;  sailors'  clothes  were  purchased,  and,  on 


34  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Monday  morning,  the  fugitive  jumped  on  the  train 
just  as  it  started.  His  baggage  had  been  put  aboard 
by  a  friendly  hackman.  He  was  greatly  troubled,  for, 
as  he  wrote  to  his  master,  ten  years  later,  "  I  was 
making  a  leap  in  the  dark.  The  probabilities,  so  far 
as  I  could  by  reason  determine  them,  were  stoutly 
against  the  undertaking.  The  preliminaries  and  pre 
cautions  I  had  adopted  previously,  all  worked  badly. 
I  was  like  one  going  to  war  without  weapons — ten 
chances  of  defeat  to  one  of  victory.  One  in  whom  I 
had  confided,  and  one  who  had  promised  me  assist 
ance,  appalled  by  fear  at  the  trial  hour,  deserted  me." 
"  However,  gloomy  as  was  the  prospect,  thanks  be  to 
the  Most  High,  who  is  ever  the  God  of  the  oppressed, 
at  the  moment  which  was  to  determine  my  whole 
earthly  career,  His  grace  was  sufficient :  my  mind 
was  made  up." 

His  anxiety  increased  in  consequence  of  the  harsh 
ness  with  which  the  conductor  questioned  other  pas 
sengers  in  the  negro  car.  The  sailor,  however,  was 
addressed  kindly  and  told,  after  a  mere  glance  at  the 
protection,  that  it  was  all  right.  Thus  far  he  was 
safe  ;  but  there  were  several  people  on  the  train  who 
would  have  known  him  at  once  in  any  other  clothes. 
A  German  blacksmith  looked  at  him  intently,  and 
apparently  recognized  him,  but  said  nothing.  On  the 
ferry  boat,  by  which  they  crossed  the  Susquehanna, 
he  found  an  old  acquaintance  employed,  and  was 
asked  some  dangerous  questions.  On  they  went, 
however,  until  they  stopped  to  let  the  train  from 
Philadelphia  pass.  At  a  window  sat  a  man  under 
whom  the  runaway  had  been  at  work  but  a  few  days 
before.  He  might  easily  have  recognized  him,  and 


THE    FUGITIVE.  35 

would  certainly  have  had  him  arrested  ;  but  fortun 
ately  he  was  looking  another  way.  The  passengers 
went  on  from  Wilmington  by  steamer  to  Philadel 
phia,  where  one  of  them  took  the  train  for  New  York  , 
and  arrived  early  on  Tuesday.  In  less  than  twenty- 
four  hours  the  slave  had  made  himself  a  free  man.  It 
was  but  a  few  months  since  he  had  become  twenty- 
one. 

He  was  astonished  at  "  the  dazzling  wonders  of 
Broadway,"  and  so  full  of  joyous  excitement  that,  as 
he  wrote  at  once  to  a  friend — we  can  guess  what 
friend — in  Baltimore,  he  felt  as  if  he  had  escaped,  like 
Daniel,  from  a  den  of  lions.  That  very  day,  how 
ever,  he  met  another  fugitive,  whom  he  had  known  in 
Baltimore  as  "  Allender's  Jake,"  and  was  told  that 
they  were  both  in  deadly  peril.  The  city  was  full  of 
Southerners  returning  home.  Many  of  the  colored 
people  could  be  bribed  into  betraying  a  runaway. 
All  their  boarding-houses  were  closely  watched,  and 
the  new  comer  must  not  think  of  looking  for  work 
upon  the  wharves.  In  fact,  the  danger  of  recapture 
was  even  greater  then  in  New  York,  than  after  the 
passage  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill.  Every  door 
seemed  closed  against  the  stranger.  He  had  no 
home,  no  friends,  no  chance  of  work,  and  he  was 
likely  soon  to  be  out  of  money,  although  his  first 
night  in  New  York  was  passed  in  the  open  air,  where 
he  slept  amid  piles  of  barrels.  He  felt  all  the  more 
alarmed  because  he  had  never  before  taken  the  full 
responsibility  of  looking  after  himself. 

At  last  he  was  obliged  to  tell  his  story  to  a  sailor 
who  looked  good-natured,  and  he  took  him  at  once  to 
his  own  house,  and  then  to  that  of  the  Secretary  of 


36  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

the  New  York  Vigilance  Committee,  Mr.  David  Rug- 
gles.  Here  he  was  sheltered  for  several  days,  during 
which  time  Anna  Murray  came  on  from  Baltimore 
and  became  his  wife.  She  could  not  have  been  mar 
ried  to  him  according  to  the  laws  of  Maryland.  He 
stated  afterwards,  in  a  letter  to  Captain  Auld,  that 
"  Instead  of  finding  my  companion  a  burden,  she  was 
truly  a  help-mate." 

The  children  of  this  marriage  were  Rosetta,  born 
June  24,  1839;  Lewis  Henry,  October  2,  1840; 
Frederick,  March  3,  1842  ;  Charles  Remond,  October 
24,  1844 ;  and  Annie,  March  22,  1849.  The  cer 
tificate,  as  given  in  his  "  Narrative,"  is  dated  Sep 
tember  15  ;  but  this  was  Saturday,  which  was  the  day 
on  which  he  traveled  to  New  Bedford  and  found  work 
men  busy  on  the  wharves.  The  wedding  took  place,  I 
understand,  on  Friday,  September  14. 

The  bridegroom  had  heard  of  New  Bedford  as  a 
place  where  he  might  be  able  to  work  at  his  trade. 
Accordingly  the  newly-married  couple  set  out  thither, 
on  the  day  of  the  ceremony,  by  steamer,  and  in  con 
formity  with  the  system  then  universally  enforced 
against  people  of  color  in  the  United  States,  spent 
the  night  on  the  deck.  A  stage-coach  took  them 
from  Newport  to  New  Bedford,  but  they  had  no 
money  to  pay  for  breakfast  or  to  the  driver,  and  he 
took  possession  of  their  baggage,  which  included 
three  music  books.  What  a  wedding  journey  ! 

The  entire  trip  from  Baltimore  to  New  Bedford 
occupied  less  than  two  weeks.  The  fugitive  had 
changed  his  name  from  Bailey,  first  to  Stanley,  and 
then,  before  his  marriage,  to  Johnson,  and  he  soon 
made  a  final  change.  He  had  been  recommended  to 


THE    FUGITIVE.  37 

a  free  colored  man,  named  Nathan  Johnson,  who  at 
once  redeemed  the  baggage,  in  which  was  a  music 
book,  the  "  Seraph,"  which  I  saw  in  use  just  fifty 
years  afterward  in  the  Douglass  mansion,  near  Wash 
ington.  At  Johnson's  house  the  fugitives  were  treated 
with  the  utmost  kindness.  During  breakfast,  the 
Sunday  after  reaching  New  Bedford,  the  host  re 
marked  that  there  were  so  many  Johnsons  in  the 
town  as  to  make  it  difficult  to  tell  them  apart.  On 
this  he  was  invited  to  choose  a  surname  for  his  guest, 
who  insisted  on  still  calling  himself  Frederick  "  to 
preserve  a  sense  of  my  identity."  Nathan  Johnson  had 
just  been  reading  the  "  Lady  of  the  Lake,"  and  he  at 
once  selected  the  name  of  the  noble  fugitive.  We 
shall  see,  hereafter,  that  the  choice  was  singularly 
apt. 

Among  the  first  lessons  which  Douglass  learnt  at 
New  Bedford,  was  the  immense  superiority  of  free  to 
slave  labor.  On  the  very  day  he  arrived  he  saw  five 
or  six  men  do  more  work  on  the  wharves,  with  the 
aid  of  an  ox  and  a  pulley,  than  had  been  done  by 
twenty  or  thirty  in  Baltimore.  He  also  soon  found 
out  the  fallacy  of  two  assertions,  often  made  before 
the  war,  namely,  that  the  South  was  more  prosperous 
than  the  North,  and  that  the  negro  was  incapable  of 
supporting  himself  as  a  free  citizen.  New  Bedford 
was  the  richest  community  in  the  United  States  in 
proportion  to  its  population,  which  trebled  between 
1820  and  1840.  In  1838  she  sent  out  nearly  two 
hundred  whalers,  and  the  previous  year  had  brought 
in  a  hundred  and  sixty  thousand  barrels  of  oil. 
Nathan  Johnson  and  his  wife  earned  their  bread  by 
hard  work  ;  but  these  two  colored  people  had  a  neater 


38  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

house,  better  food,  more  books  and  newspapers,  and 
more  general  information  than  nine-tenths  of  the 
slaveholders  in  Talbot  County.  Many  a  fugitive  was 
living  more  comfortably  than  the  master  from  whom 
he  had  fled  less  than  seven  years  before.  The 
colored  people  were  better  treated  in  New  Bedford 
than  in  any  other  place,  Northern  or  Southern  ;  their 
children  went  to  school  with  the  whites  ;  and  their 
determination  to  stand  by  each  other  made  the  cap 
ture  of  a  fugitive  impossible. 

Our  hero  now  felt  so  safe  that,  on  Monday  morn 
ing,  he  dressed  himself  for  work,  and  went  out  to  find 
it.  Seeing  a  pile  of  coal  in  front  of  a  house  he  got 
leave  to  shovel  it  into  the  cellar.  This  was  his  first 
work  as  a  freeman,  and  it  was  for  the  minister  who 
had  just  been  installed  over  the  Unitarian  Society, 
Rev.  Ephraim  Peabody.  Four  years  earlier  he  had 
written  from  New  Orleans  to  Harriet  Martineau  : 
"  All  my  sympathies,  and  to  a  very  great  extent,  my 
judgment  is  with  the  Abolitionists — entirely  so  if  Dr. 
Channing  is  one."  His  preaching  did  not  fulfill  this 
promise,  either  at  New  Bedford,  or  afterward,  at 
King's  Chapel,  where  his  ideal  was  "not  an  agitator, 
nor  a  revolutionist,  nor  a  professional  reformer."  He 
and  Douglass  had  much  to  teach  each  other ;  the 
fugitive  did  get  help  from  the  clergyman,  and  if  the 
latter's  official  position  had  not  stood  between  them, 
it  is  possible  that  Unitarianism  would  have  made  an 
illustrious  convert,  that  the  oppressed  would  have 
gained  an  influential  champion,  and  that  King's 
Chapel  would  have  lost  the  chance  to  get  a  pastor 
who  could  offend  nobody.  It  was  Mrs.  Peabody  who 
gave  leave  to  carry  in  the  coal,  and  it  was  she  who 


THE    FUGITIVE.  39 

put  two  silver  half-dollars  into  a  hand  which  clasped 
the  coins  gladly,  in  the  knowledge  that  no  master 
could  take  them  away,  but  whatever  was  earned  by 
the  laborer  would  remain  his  own. 

His  next  job  was  to  help  load  a  sloop  with  oil.  He 
soon  got  courage  enough  to  try  to  work  at  his  trade 
of  calker,  and  a  place  was  offered  him  by  an  anti- 
slavery  man  who  was  fitting  out  a  whaler.  He  had 
no  sooner  set  foot  on  the  float,  however,  than  all  the 
white  calkers  declared  that  they  would  leave  the  ship 
unfinished,  if  he  were  allowed  to  strike  a  single  blow 
upon  her.  It  was  a  busy  season,  and  the  employer 
could  do  no  better  for  him  than  give  him  work  as  a 
common  laborer.  The  same  prejudice  met  him  every 
where,  and  obliged  him  to  content  himself  with  earn 
ing  only  a  dollar  a  day,  whereas  he  was  perfectly 
competent  to  earn  two.  In  this  respect  he  was  even 
worse  treated  than  in  Baltimore,  where  he  was  paid 
a  dollar  and  a  half  a  day,  as  much  as  any  white  man, 
for  calking.  Later  in  the  season  he  supported  him 
self  by  sawing  wood  for  the  whalers,  and  he  never 
worked  harder,  even  for  Brother  Covey.  On  borrow 
ing  Mr.  Johnson's  saw,  he  found  it  needed  a  cord  as  a 
brace  ;  so  he  went  to  a  store  and  asked  for  a  fip's 
worth,  but  was  at  once  told,  rather  sharply,  that  he 
must  have  come  from  the  South.  No  harm  came 
from  this  blunder,  however,  except  a  fright. 

His  wife  went  out  to  service,  and  he  was  obliged  to 
do  so  during  the  first  winter,  when  prices  were  unusu 
ally  high.  While  waiter  in  the  family  of  Colonel 
John  H.  Clifford,  who  was  Governor  of  Massachusetts 
in  1853,  he  once  listened  with  great  delight  to  the 
conversation  of  Robert  C.  Winthrop,  behind  whose 


40  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

chair  he  stood.  He  seems,  however,  to  have  found 
waiting  at  table  less  pleasant  than  even  sawing  wood, 
rolling  oil  casks,  digging  cellars,  removing  rubbish 
from  back  yards,  and  scouring  cabins.  His  preference 
for  steady  work  made  him  soon  take  a  place  in  an  oil 
refinery,  where  he  stayed  as  long  as  he  was  needed. 
Then  he  found  employment,  with  other  colored  men, 
whom  he  esteemed  highly,  in  fitting  out  whalers  ; 
and  his  last  place  in  New  Bedford  was  at  Richmond's 
brass  foundry.  Here  he  often  worked  every  day  and 
two  nights  a  week  besides,  his  principal  task  being  to 
blow  the  bellows.  This  was  afterward  done  by 
steam  ;  but  he  kept  working  at  it  until  he  was  pro 
moted  to  blow  one  of  the  trumpets  before  whose 
blast  fell  the  walls  of  Jericho. 

His  zeal  for  religion  had  been  much  weakened  by 
what  he  saw  of  the  white  professors  in  Maryland  :  but 
now  he  felt  that  the  Lord  had  brought  him  out  of  the 
house  of  bondage,  and  he  sought  to  unite  with  one  of 
the  New  Bedford  churches.  The  Methodists,  who 
then  worshiped  in  Elm  Street,  and  afterward  in 
County  Street,  had,  in  1838,  a  preacher  who  was  so 
attractive  that  Douglass  determined  to  become  a 
member.  He  was  not  permitted,  on  account  of  his 
color,  to  sit  in  the  body  of  the  house  ;  but  he  accepted 
this  proscription  as  a  necessary  deference  to  the 
prejudices  of  the  unconverted  part  of  the  congrega 
tion.  He  felt  sure  that  the  church  members  would 
treat  him  as  a  man  and  a  brother.  "  Surely,"  he  said 
to  himself,  "  these  Christian  people  have  none  of  this 
feeling  against  color.  They,  at  least,  have  renounced 
this  unholy  feeling.  When  none  but  the  saints  are 
assembled  they  will  certainly  recognize  us  as  children 


THE    FUGITIVE.  41 

of  the  same  Father,  and  heirs  of  the  same  salvation 
on  equal  terms  with  themselves." 

"Communion  day  came;  the  sermon  was  preached;  the 
congregation  departed  ;  and  I  remained  to  see,  as  I  thought, 
this  holy  sacrament  celebrated  in  the  spirit  of  its  Great 
Founder.  There  were  only  about  half  a  dozen  colored  people 
attached  to  the  Elm  Street  Church  at  this  time.  After  the 
congregation  was  dismissed  these  descended  from  the  gallery 
and  took  a  seat  against  the  wall  most  distant  from  the  altar. 
Brother  B.  was  very  animated,  and  sang  very  sweetly,  '  Salva 
tion,  'tis  a  joyful  sound  ; '  and  soon  he  began  to  administer  the 
sacrament.  I  was  anxious  to  observe  the  bearing  of  the 
colored  members  ;  and  the  result  was  most  humiliating.  Dur 
ing  the  whole  ceremony  they  looked  like  sheep  without  a  shep 
herd.  The  white  members  went  forward  to  the  altar  by  the 
bench-full ;  and  when  it  was  evident  that  all  the  whites  had 
been  served  with  the  bread  and  wine,  Brother  B.,  after  a  long 
pause,  as  if  inquiring  whether  all  the  whites  had  been  served, 
and  fully  assuring  himself  on  that  important  point,  then  raised 
his  voice  to  an  unnatural  pitch,  and,  looking  to  the  corner 
where  his  black  sheep  seemed  penned,  beckoned  with  his  hand, 
exclaiming,  '  come  forward,  colored  friends  !  come  forward  ! 
You,  too,  have  an  interest  in  the  blood  of  Christ.  God  is  no 
respecter  of  persons.  Come  forward  and  take  this  holy  sacra 
ment  to  your  comfort.'  The  colored  members — poor,  slavish 
souls — went  forward  as  invited.  I  went  out,  and  have  never 
been  in  that  church  since." 

Other  churches  were  tried  with  the  same  result. 
When  one  of  them  was  holding  a  revival,  he  ven 
tured  to  try  to  sit  on  the  broad  aisle  ;  but  a  deacon 
hastened  to  say,  what  was  then  often  said  by  drivers 
of  omnibuses,  door-keepers  at  menageries  and  thea 
ters,  and  officials  on  board  of  steamboats  and  rail 
road  cars,  "  We  don't  allow  niggers  in  here."  After 


42  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

many  such  rebuffs  from  the  white  ministers  and  dea 
cons,  he  joined  the  African  M.  E.  Zion  Church,  but 
he  soon  left  it,  because  the  pastor  was  persuaded  by 
other  clergymen  to  refuse,  like  them,  to  give  out 
notices  of  anti-slavery  meetings.  He  remained,  how 
ever,  one  of  the  colored  Methodists,  and  occasionally 
officiated  as  a  lay  preacher  in  the  little  school-house 
on  Second  Street,  where  they  worshiped. 

During  these  early  years  at  New  Bedford,  he  saved 
from  drowning  a  boy,  whom  no  one  else  ventured  to 
try  to  rescue  ;  a  man  named  Sullivan  had  been  also 
saved  at  St.  Michael's,  after  grappling  with  his  pre 
server  in  a  way  which  nearly  proved  fatal  to  them 
both  ;  and  a  white  boy,  who  broke  through  the  thin 
ice  in  a  basin  near  Baltimore,  owed  his  life  to  the 
courage  and  presence  of  mind  with  which  the  black 
boy,  then  only  twelve,  managed  to  reach  him  with  an 
oar. 

The  New  Bedford  Lyceum  was  not  open  at  that 
time  to  colored  people,  but  they  held  many  meetings 
for  discussion  among  themselves,  and  Douglass  was 
an  eager  listener,  as  well  as  an  impressive  speaker.  He 
had  little  time  to  read,  but  how  well  it  was  used  may 
be  judged  from  his  habit  of  nailing  up  a  newspaper  on 
a  post  in  the  foundry,  so  that  he  could  look  at  it 
while  he  worked  the  heavy  beam  up  and  down  to  fill 
the  bellows.  He  made  himself  well  acquainted  with 
Scott,  Whittier,  and  other  poets,  while  Combe's  "  Con 
stitution  of  Man,"  taught  him  the  supremacy  of  law 
and  order  in  nature,  as  well  as  the  possibility  of 
attaining  happiness  here  on  earth  by  obedience  to 
natural  laws.  This  book,  he  says,  "  relieved  my  path 
of  many  shadows  ;"  but  what  he  read  most  devoutly, 


THE    FUGITIVE.  43 

next  to  the  Bible,  was  the  "  Liberator."  Soon- after 
becoming  a  subscriber,  he  listened,  on  April  15,  1839, 
to  a  lecture  from  Garrison,  of  whom  he  speaks  thus  : 

"  As  I  looked  upon  this  man  from  the  gallery  of  old  Liberty 
Hall,  then  otherwise  deserted,  dilapidated,  and  in  ill-repute, 
with  its  wood-work  defaced,  its  doors  off  hinges,  and  its  win 
dows  broken  by  stones  and  bad  eggs,  thrown  to  break  up  anti- 
slavery  meetings,  the  only  place  in  town  where  such  meetings 
could  be  held,  I  saw  that  the  hour  and  the  man  were  well  met 
and  well  united.  In  him  there  was  no  contradiction  between 
the  speech  and  the  speaker,  but  absolute  sympathy  and  one 
ness.  The  faces  of  millions  of  men  might  be  searched  without 
finding  one  just  like  his  ;  at  least,  it  seemed  so  to  me.  In  him 
I  saw  the  resurrection  and  the  life  of  the  dead  and  buried  hopes 
of  my  enslaved  people.  As  I  now  remember,  the  style  of  Mr. 
Garrison's  speaking  would  not  be  called  eloquent.  There  was 
no  fine  flow  of  words,  no  dazzling  sentences  formed  to  tickle 
the  ear.  His  power  was  the  power  which  belongs  only  to 
character,  conviction,  and  high  moral  purpose,  and  which  can 
not  well  be  counterfeited." — ("  Thoughts  and  Recollections  of 
the  Anti-Slavery  Conflict."  A  Lecture  not  yet  printed.) 

The  express  statement  (in  "  Life  and  Times  of 
Frederick  Douglass,"  pp.  242-3),  about  the  first  Aboli 
tionist,  that,  "On  this  occasion  he  announced  nearly 
all  his  heresies,"  has  been  declared  inconsistent  with 
his  habits  when  he  spoke  as  agent  of  the  Massachu 
setts  Anti-Slavery  Society,  which  was  then  the  case. 
("William  Lloyd  Garrison:  the  Story  of  His  Life. 
Told  by  his  Children."  Vol.  ii.,  p.  292,  note.) 

The  columns  of  the  "  Liberator,"  however,  were 
full  of  arguments  in  favor  of  making  no  resistance  to 
evil,  and  it  is  possible  that  some  allusion  to  this  sub 
ject  may  have  inadvertently  been  made  in  the  lecture, 


44  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

and  eagerly  taken  up  by  an  enthusiastic  hearer,  who 
did  not  see  that  he  had  demonstrated  the  falsity  of  the 
doctrine  in  his  own  victory  over  slavery,  in  the  person 
of  Covey.  In  this  and  other  respects,  Douglass  was 
then  an  ardent  Garrisonian.  He  "  loved  this  paper 
and  its  editor  ;"  he  took  frequent  occasion  to  attack 
slavery,  not  only  in  assemblages  of  colored  people, 
but  in  conversation  with  white  laborers,  and  he 
promptly  attended  every  anti-slavery  meeting  in  New 
Bedford,  his  "  heart  burning  at  every  true  utterance 
against  the  slave  system,  and  every  rebuke  of  its 
friends  and  supporters." 

Among  other  speakers  whom  he  heard  in  Liberty 
Hall  was  Rev.  Dr.  Garnett,  a  man  of  pure  African 
blood,  afterwards  Minister  to  Liberia.  It  is  remarked 
that  only  a  man  who  has  felt  the  iron  of  slavery  in  his 
own  soul,  and  has  been  accustomed  to  look  on  his  own 
race  as  doomed  and  altogether  wanting  in  great  mental 
qualities  "  can  well  imagine  my  exultant  feeling,  while 
looking  upon,  and  listening  to,  this  brilliant  contra 
diction  to  the  degrading  and  disheartening  theories 
which  had  been  forced  upon  me  by  nearly  all  my  pre 
vious  history." 

Such  speakers  were  sorely  needed  in  1840.  The 
Pennsylvania  Abolition  Society  had  been  formed, 
books  had  been  printed  against  slavery,  and  laws  to 
check  its  increase  had  been  passed  before  the  Revolu 
tionary  War.  Soon  after  that  struggle,  new  societies 
were  formed  in  Rhode  Island,  Connecticut,  New 
York,  New  Jersey,  Delaware,  Maryland,  and  even 
Virginia.  Vermont  prohibited  the  wicked  institution 
in  1777  ;  and  her  example  was  followed  throughout 
the  North.  A  demand  for  immediate  emancipation 


THE    FUGITIVE.  45 

was  published  in  1816,  and  another  in  1824.  Few 
desired  any  but  gradual  measures,  however  ;  and  the 
general  character  of  the  controversy  was  mild  and 
peaceable  before  1830.  Then  began  what  Harriet 
Martineau  has  called  "  The  Martyr  Age  of  the  United 
States."  William  Lloyd  Garrison  insisted  zealously, 
as  one  of  the  editors  of  a  Baltimore  newspaper,  in 
1829,  on  immediate  and  unconditional  emancipation, 
without  expatriation.  He  showed  that  the  Coloniza 
tion  Society,  while  professedly  friendly  to  the  colored 
race,  was  really  an  enemy  ;  and  he  frequently  exposed 
the  horrors  of  the  domestic  slave  trade,  then  flour 
ishing  rankly  in  Baltimore.  An  attack  on  a  merchant 
in  Massachusetts,  who  allowed  his  ship  to  be  employed 
in  this  traffic,  caused  Garrison  to  be  imprisoned  for 
seven  weeks,  in  the  spring  of  1830.  He  could  get  no 
church  that  fall  in  Boston  for  his  lectures,  nor  any 
hall,  except  one  belonging  to  a  society  of  unbelievers, 
who  had  no  especial  interest  in  his  cause,  but  who 
did  believe  in  freedom  of  speech.  The  first  number 
of  the  "Liberator"  was  published  on  January  i, 
1831  ;  and  before  the  close  of  that  year,  five  thousand 
dollars  was  offered  by  the  State  of  Georgia  as  a  re 
ward  for  kidnapping  the  editor.  Opposition  only 
made  him  more  zealous  and  steadfast.  To  a  fellow- 
laborer,  who  urged  him  at  this  time  to  keep  cool, 
saying,  "  Why,  you  are  all  on  fire  !  "  he  answered, 
"Brother  May,  I  have  need  to  be  all  on  fire,  for  I 
have  mountains  of  ice  about  me  to  melt." 

And  it  must  not  be  supposed  that  all  the  fire  and 
fury  were  on  one  side.  Among  the  events  of  the 
seven  years  between  1831  and  1839  were  the  follow 
ing.  A  Connecticut  lady  was  put  into  a  prison  cell, 


46  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

which  had  been  occupied  by  a  murderer,  because  she 
was  trying  to  educate  colored  girls ;  she  and  her 
pupils  were  molested  in  every  possible  way  ,  and  the 
school  was  finally  broken  up  by  attempts  to  burn  and 
tear  down  her  house.  An  academy,  which  was  opened 
to  colored  people  in  New  Hampshire,  was  dragged 
from  its  foundations  by  a  hundred  yoke  of  oxen, 
according  to  a  vote  in  town-meeting,  and  set  up  as  a 
laughing-stock  upon  the  common.  The  formation  of 
anti-slavery  societies  in  New  York  and  Philadelphia 
took  place  with  great  difficulty,  amid  dangerous  mobs. 
The  meeting  of  the  American  Society  in  New  York, 
on  July  4,  was  broken  up  by  rioters,  who  held  posses 
sion  of  the  city  for  three  days,  and  did  much  damage 
to  churches,  schools,  and  private  residences  ;  and  that 
August  a  Philadelphia  mob  destroyed  forty-four 
houses  of  colored  people  and  murdered  a  black  man, 
while  another  was  drowned  in  trying  to  escape.  One 
day,  in  the  next  year,  October  21,  1835,  there  were 
three  mobs,  that  in  broad-cloth  which  put  a  rope 
around  Garrison's  waist,  tore  his  clothes  from  his 
body,  and  might  have  injured  him  seriously,  if  a  re 
fuge  had  not  been  found  in  Boston  jail  ;  that  headed 
by  a  member  of  Congress,  which  drove  out  of  Utica, 
New  York,  a  convention  of  some  seven  hundred 
delegates,  engaged  in  the  formation  of  a  State  anti- 
slavery  society  ;  arid  that  which  broke  up  a  meeting 
in  Montpelier,  Vermont.  The  brother  of  the  Con 
necticut  lady  just  mentioned  was  then  serving  out  a 
sentence  of  eight  months  in  the  Washington  jail  for 
having  used  anti-slavery  newspapers  as  wrappers  for 
botanical  specimens  ;  and  a  divinity  student,  who  had 
committed  a  similar  offence  at  Nashville,  Tennessee, 


THE    FUGITIVE.  47 

was  whipped  with  twenty  lashes  on  his  bare  back. 
And  among  the  outrages  of  1835  should  also  be  men 
tioned  the  attempts  of  various  Southern  States  to 
have  their  example,  in  suppressing  all  discussion  of 
slavery,  carried  out,  by  law  as  well  as  by  violence, 
throughout  the  North.  During  the  next  year  the 
printing-press  of  J.  G.  Birney,  soon  to  be  a  candidate 
for  the  Presidency,  was  destroyed  by  a  Cincinnati 
mob  ;  a  New  England  clergyman  was  sentenced  to 
three  months  of  hard  labor  in  the  house  of  correction 
for  his  lectures  ;  and  despotic  interference  with  the 
mails  was  proposed  in  Congress.  But  these  details 
seem  almost  trivial  when  we  think  that  a  fugitive 
slave  was  burned  alive  in  St.  Louis  soon  after,  for 
having  stabbed  the  officers  who  took  him  prisoner  ; 
that  a  Presbyterian  clergyman,  who  was  trying  to 
save  from  destruction  the  printing  office,  where  he 
had  denounced  this  and  other  fruits  of  slavery,  was 
shot  dead  in  Illinois  ;  and  that  Pennsylvania  Hall, 
which  had  been  built  at  a  cost  of  $40,000,  as  a  place 
for  freedom  of  speech  about  all  reforms,  was  burned 
by  a  mob,  who  also  set  on  fire  the  "  Shelter  for 
Colored  Orphans." 

All  these  persecutions  took  place  before  the  arrival 
of  Mr.  Douglass  in  New  Bedford,  where  he  must 
have  heard  them  often  discussed  ;  and  they  show, 
like  his  own  treatment  in  churches  and  shipyards, 
that  the  North  was  still  with  the  South  against  his 
race.  All  the  anti-slavery  philanthropists  were  but  a 
helpless  minority,  amid  the  violence  of  opposition, 
which  marshaled  churches  and  newspapers,  State  and 
city  governments,  police  and  militia,  colleges  and 
courts  of  justice,  fine  ladies  and  business  men, 


48  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

laborers  and  rowdies,  in  fact,  almost  the  entire  popu 
lation  of  the  free  States  against  them.  The  evils  of 
slavery  were  scarcely  realized  in  the  North  ;  the 
pressure  of  family,  denominational,  political,  and 
commercial  ties  with  the  South,  was  very  strong  ; 
fears  that  agitation  would  bring  on  civil  war  had 
already  been  excited  ;  and  many  good  and  wise  men 
considered  themselves  bound  by  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States  to  refrain  from  any  attacks  on  insti 
tutions  whose  preservation  seemed  guaranteed  by 
that  great  compact.  Conservative  people  were  espe 
cially  alarmed  at  the  irreverence  with  which  the  laws 
and  the  Constitution  were  treated,  as  well  as  at  the 
encouragement  of  women  to  speak  in  public.  The 
latter  fact  was  peculiarly  important  to  the  clergy,  as 
the  former  was  to  lawyers  and  business  men. 

Disunionism  could  not,  strictly  speaking,  be  fairly 
charged  against  the  Abolitionists  before  1842  ;  but 
the  Declaration  of  Sentiments,  which  had  been 
adopted  nine  years  earlier  by  the  American  Anti- 
Slavery  Society,  on  organizing  at  Philadelphia,  and 
which  had  been  drawn  up  by  Garrison,  with  the 
approval  of  Whittier  and  S.  J.  May,  speaks  thus  of 
the  support  given  to  slave-holders  by  people  of  the 
free  States,  under  the  Constitution:  "This  relation 
to  slavery  is  criminal  and  full  of  danger  ;  it  must  be 
broken  up."  Even  from  the  beginning  there  was 
strong  temptation  to  overlook  the  many  peculiarly 
good  features  of  our  form  of  government,  in  the 
earnestness  of  indignation  against  one  black  spot. 
Mr.  Garrison  was  led,  by  a  desire  to  follow  the 
Gospels  literally,  into  maintaining  that  physical  force 
ought  never  to  be  used  in  resisting  evil,  or  accepted 


THE    FUGITIVE.  49 

as  the  foundation  of  government.  He  declared  in 
the  "  Liberator  "  for  1837,  that  human  governments 
are  the  results  of  disobedience  to  God,  that  they  are 
to  be  preferred  to  anarchy  just  as  is  "  the  small-pox 
to  the  Asiatic  cholera,"  and  that  "  They  are  all  anti- 
Christ.  ("  William  Lloyd  Garrison  :  the  Story  of  His 
Life.  Told  by  His  Children."  Vol.  ii.,  pp.  150,  202.) 

Whittier  complained  that  "  He  fills  his  paper  with 
no-governmentism,"  and  Elizur  Wright  declared  that 
"  His  plan  of  rescuing  the  slave  by  the  destruction  of 
human  laws  is  fatally  conflictive  with  ours."  The 
discontent  of  the  most  patriotic  Abolitionists  was 
increased,  as  he  founded,  in  1838,  a  Non-Resistance 
Society,  with  the  approval  of  Oliver  Johnson,  S.  J. 
May,  Edmund  Quincy,  H.  C.  Wright,  Stephen  S. 
Foster,  Lydia  Maria  Child,  Maria  W.  Chapman,  Abby 
Kelley,  and  Lucretia  Mott.  The  Declaration  of  Senti 
ments  pledged  its  members  not  to  vote  or  hold  office, 
and  it  is  expressly  stated,  that  "  We  cannot  acknowl 
edge  allegiance  to  any  human  government." 

Such  language,  at  a  time  when  an  anti-slavery 
meeting  was  sure  to  call  out  a  mob,  was  more  cour 
ageous  than  prudent.  A  clergyman  or  magistrate 
might  seem  to  justify  himself  for  declining  to  inter 
fere  by  saying  :  "  Men  who  disown  allegiance  to  our 
government  have  no  right  to  be  protected  against  the 
righteous  indignation  which  is  called  out  by  their 
disloyalty.  They  are  to  blame  themselves  for  these 
mobs."  We  can  all  see  now  that  these  early  Aboli 
tionists  were  men  and  women  of  whom  the  world  was' 
not  worthy  ;  but  I  cannot  help  regretting  that  they 
were  not  a  little  more  under  the  guidance  of  worldly 
wisdom. 


50  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Mr.  Garrison's  anarchism,  as  it  would  now  be 
called,  was  particularly  important,  because  this  was 
in  all  probability,  as  is  expressly  stated  by  a  fellow- 
champion  who  is  also  one  of  the  historians  of  the 
great  conflict,  William  Goodell,  what  kept  him  from 
becoming  "  an  early  and  zealous  leader  of  the  Liberty 
party."  This  organization,  which  developed  first  into 
the  Free  Soil  and  then  into  the  Republican  party,  and 
finally  abolished  slavery,  nominated  a  singularly  good 
candidate  for  the  presidency  in  1840.  Birney  had 
been  a  prominent  lawyer  in  Alabama,  and  had 
emancipated  his  slaves  before  he  tried,  first  in 
Kentucky,  and  then  in  Ohio,  to  edit  an  anti-slavery 
paper  which  was  destroyed  three  times  by  mobs  ; 
and  he  was  then  serving  as  secretary  of  the  American 
Anti-Slavery  Society.  The  nomination  was  supported 
by  Whittier,  Sewall,  Goodell,  Gerrit  Smith,  Myron 
Holley,  and  other  prominent  Abolitionists,  and  it  was 
made  under  the  official  direction  of  the  State  Anti- 
Slavery  Society  of  New  York.  Most  of  the  men  who 
sympathized  with  the  movement  were  determined  to 
vote,  and  the  only  question  wras  whether  they  should 
support  Birney  or  one  of  the  pro-slavery  candidates, 
Van  Buren  and  Harrison.  The  good  of  the  cause 
demanded  that  the  vote  of  the  Liberty  party  should 
be  made  as  large  as  possible,  and  I  see  a  sad  lack  of 
ability  either  to  appreciate  a  republican  form  of 
government,  or  to  cooperate  with  those  who  differed 
with  him  even  slightly,  in  Garrison's  course.  He 
followed  up  the  nomination  by  expressing  in  the 
"  Liberator  "  his  surprise  at  "  the  folly,  the  presump 
tion,  the  almost  unequaled  infatuation  of  the  handful 
of  Abolitionists."  It  rested  largely  with  him  to  say 


THE    FUGITIVE.  51 

what  gains  should  be  made  by  this  handful  among 
the  two  hundred  thousand  members  of  the  anti- 
slavery  societies  ;  and  Birney's  failure  to  get  much 
more  than  seven  thousand  votes  was  largely  due  to 
the  action  taken  six  weeks  after  his  nomination  by 
the  Garrisonians  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the 
American  Anti-Slavery  Society  in  May,  1840,  in  New 
York.  Fearing  to  be  outvoted,  about  four  hundred 
and  fifty  of  them  came  from  New  England  by  a 
special  steamer,  forming  what  their  leader  called  in 
the  "  Liberator  "  <;  a  heart-stirring  spectacle  !  "  About 
a  hundred  others  of  his  followers  came  by  rail  ;  and, 
as  only  about  a  thousand  votes  were  cast,  the  conven 
tion  was  completely  under  his  control.  He  used  it  to 
pass  resolutions,  disapproving  of  the  nomination  of 
Birney  and  another  Abolitionist,  "  as  inexpedient  and 
injurious  to  the  cause,"  and  declaring  that  "  We 
cannot  advise  our  friends  to  waste  their  energies  in 
futile  efforts  to  promote  their  election." 

There  is  no  pleasure  in  dwelling  on  the  mistakes  of 
men  like  Garrison,  and  I  hasten  to  speak  of  a  point  of 
controversy  where  he  was  clearly  in  the  right.  One 
reason  why  he  and  his  adherents  captured  the  con 
vention  was  that  they  feared  it  might  be  packed 
against  them  by  men  who  wished  to  shut  out  all 
women  from  the  work.  Lucretia  Mott  was  not  al 
lowed  to  vote  at  the  formation  of  the  American  So 
ciety,  in  1833,  but  only  to  speak  ;  the  two  sexes  had 
to  organize  separate  associations  ;  and  it  was  not  con 
sidered  proper  for  women  to  advocate  reforms  in 
print  or  in  any  place  more  public  than  a  Quaker 
meeting-house.  Shortly  before  Garrison  was  mobbed 
in  Boston,  he  published,  in  the  "  Liberator,"  a  letter  of 


52  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

sympathy  from  the  daughter  of  a  judge  in  the  Su 
preme  Court  of  South  Carolina.  Miss  Angelina 
Grimke  had  abandoned  her  home  and  family  in  hor 
ror  at  the  system  in  which  she  had  been  brought  up, 
and  in  1836  she  felt  it  her  duty  to  publish  an  "Ap 
peal  to  Southern  Women,"  which  was  publicly  burned 
by  the  postmasters  in  South  Carolina,  while  the 
Mayor  of  Charleston  sent  her  word  that  she  could 
not  be  suffered  to  go  there  on  a  visit  to  her  mother. 
She  was  soon  afterward  invited  to  hold  a  series 
of  women's  meetings  in  New  York  parlors,  but 
the  audience  increased  so  much  that  she  made  the 
unheard-of  innovation  of  speaking  in  the  session 
room  of  a  Baptist  church.  Her  next  step  was  to 
address  colored  people  of  both  sexes,  and  in  June, 
1837,  at  Lynn,  she  spoke  for  the  first  time  to  a  mixed 
audience  in  which  white  men  listened  eagerly.  Her 
sister  Sarah  assisted  her  ;  both  asserted  their  right  to 
speak  and  publish  ;  and  both  were  denounced  by  the 
Congregational  ministers  of  Massachusetts  in  the 
"  Pastoral  Letter,"  best  known  through  the  poem 
which  was  called  out  in  reply  from  Whittier.  Even  he, 
however,  felt  obliged  to  warn  them  privately  against 
injuring  the  cause  of  the  slave  by  bringing  in  a 
new  question  prematurely.  "  Carolina's  high-souled 
daughters,"  as  he  calls  them,  knew  better  than  any 
one  else  how  to  help  the  slave,  and  Angelina  was 
soon  seen  standing  in  the  Speaker's  place  in  the  Hall 
of  Representatives  in  Boston,  speaking  to  the  mem 
bers  of  the  Legislature,  while  the  seats  were  filled 
with  the  best  and  brightest  people  in  the  State.  Her 
last  appearance  in  public  was  in  Pennsylvania  Hall, 
before  a  mob  who  became  quiet  under  the  power  of 


THE    FUGITIVE.  ^3 

her  voice  ;  but  twenty  hours  later  the  building  was 
set  on  fire.  She  had  then  been  for  three  days  a  bride. 

By  this  time  there  were  fighting  in  the  front  rank 
against  slavery,  not  only  Lucretia  Mott  and  the 
Grimke  sisters,  but  Mrs.  Lydia  Maria  Child,  Miss 
Abby  Kelley,  who  has  been  sadly  confounded  with  the 
half-witted  Abby  Folsom,  and  that  gifted  lady  whose 
activity  had  caused  her  to  be  nick-named  "  Captain 
Chapman."  To  recognize  their  services  was  simply 
just,  and  it  would  have  been  a  disgrace  to  the  cause 
if  the  American  Society  had  failed,  in  May,  1839,  to 
enlarge  its  membership  beyond  the  line  of  sex.  The 
motion  was  supported  by  Garrison,  Phillips,  Gerrit 
Smith,  C.  C.  Burleigh,  and  Oliver  Johnson,  but  it  had 
only  a  hundred  and  eighty-one  votes  against  a  hun 
dred  and  forty-one.  A  year  later  the  question  wras 
decided  again  in  the  same  way,  by  giving  Miss  Kelley 
a  place  on  a  committee  ;  and  this  time  the  vote  was 
five  hundred  and  fifty-seven  against  four  hundred 
and  fifty-one.  The  fact  that  each  side  had  trebled  its 
strength  favors  the  supposition  that  both  had  tried  to 
pack  the  convention. 

The  result  of  this  action,  and  of  the  attack  on  the 
Liberty  candidates,  was  a  secession  in  which  clergy 
men  were  prominent.  Rival  societies  were  formed  ; 
and  a  new  paper  was  started  in  opposition  to  the 
"  Liberator."  This  last  manifestation  was  short-lived; 
but  it  is  estimated  that  about  four-fifths  of  the  men 
who  had  been  working  with  Garrison,  now  parted 
company  with  him  permanently.  Most  of  the  churches 
which  had  hitherto  been  open  to  the  Garrisonians 
were  now  closed  against  them.  Where  they  did 
speak,  their  audiences  were,  for  a  time,  unexpectedly 


54 


FREDERICK.    DOUGLASS. 


scanty  ;  and  Stephen  S.  Foster  was  driven  to  adopt 
the  plan  of  speaking  in  church  without  leave,  where 
he  had  failed  to  obtain  it.  What  he  suffered  in  con 
sequence  will  be  told  in  the  next  chapter.  It  must 
now  be  remarked  that,  previous  to  1841,  the  Abolition 
ists  had  shown  no  hostility  to  the  Church  ;  although 
they  had  good  reason  to  regret  her  supporting  slav 
ery  against  them.  They  were  among  the  most  saintly 
of  her  children,  and  they  still  hoped  to  save  her  from 
being  misled  by  time-serving  hirelings.  If  the  Gar- 
risonians  erred  at  all  in  regard  to  the  Gospel,  it  was 
in  following  it  too  literally  and  zealously.  It  is  true, 
that  Garrison  had  called  out  some  opposition  by 
views  about  the  Sabbath,  which  do  not  now  seem 
irreligious ;  but  his  main  heresies  were  in  regard  to 
the  prejudices  about  color  and  sex. 

No  one  of  these  new  movements  can  be  properly 
understood,  except  by  looking  at  it  in  connection  with 
many  other  recent  and  alarming  innovations.  The  year 
1840  stood  nearer  to  1890,  in  the  readiness  with  which 
all  received  opinions,  even  about  clothing  and  food, 
were  called  in  question,  than  to  1820,  when  contro 
versy  was  mainly  inside  of  the  old-fashioned  limits. 
Then  Sidney  Smith  complained  that  "  The  Ameri 
cans  are  a  brave,  industrious,  and  acute  people  ;  but 
they  have  hitherto  given  no  indications  of  genius, 
and  made  no  approaches  to  the  heroic,  either  in  their 
morality  or  in  their  character."  .  .  .  "  During 
the  thirty  or  forty  years  of  their  independence,  they 
have  done  absolutely  nothing  for  the  sciences,  for  the 
arts,  for  literature,  or  even  for  the  statesman-like 
studies  of  politics  or  political  economy."  .  .  .  "In 
the  four  quarters  of  the  globe,  who  reads  an  American 


THE    FUGITIVE.  55 

book?"  Twenty  years,  from  the  time  when  these 
words  were  written,  sufficed  to  bring  forward  Emer 
son,  Channing,  Prescott,  Bancroft,  Poe,  Hawthorne, 
Cooper,  Holmes,  Longfellow,  Whittier,  and  other 
authors  who  were  read  in  many  lands.  The  thinker, 
who  rightly  stands  first  on  this  list,  as  most  original, 
and  who  has  made  many  readers  feel  as  completely 
emancipated  as  Douglass  did  on  reaching  New  Bed 
ford,  said  in  his  lecture  on  "  Man,  the  Reformer,"  in 
1841  :  "  In  the  history  of  the  world,  the  doctrine  of 
reform  never  had  such  scope  as  at  the  present  hour." 
Former  accusers  of  society  "  all  respected  something 
— Church  or  State,  literature  or  history,  domestic 
usages,  the  market  town,  the  dinner  table,  coined 
money.  But  now  these  and  all  things  else  hear  the 
trumpet  and  must  rush  to  judgment — Christianity, 
the  laws,  commerce,  schools,  the  farm,  the  laboratory; 
and  not  a  kingdom,  town,  statute,  rite,  calling,  man, 
or  woman,  but  it  is  threatened  by  the  new  spirit."  In 
another  lecture  of  the  same  year  he  says,  "  The  pres 
ent  age  will  be  marked  by  its  harvest  of  projects  for 
this  reform  of  domestic,  civil,  literary,  and  ecclesias 
tical  institutions.  The  leaders  of  the  crusades  against 
war,  negro  slavery,  intemperance,  government  based 
on  force,  usages  of  trade,  court  and  custom-house 
oaths,  and  so  on  to  the  agitators  on  the  system  of 
education  and  the  laws  of  property,  are  the  right  suc 
cessors  of  Luther,  Knox,  Robinson,  Fox,  Penn, Wesley, 
and  Whitefield." 

Before  these  last  words  were  spoken  in  public,  the 
band  of  agitators  had  been  joined  by  a  new  member, 
who  had  deeper  experience  than  any  of  his  brethren 
of  the  wrongs  which  he  helped  to  right.  We  shall  see 


56  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

him  rapidly  rise  to  his  full  height  of  culture  and  genius, 
bear  his  share  of  persecution,  and  master  all  the  con 
ditions  of  success  in  that  great  reform  with  which 
his  name  is  forever  associated,  so  thoroughly  as  to 
grow  wiser  than  his  original  teacher,  Garrison,  and 
do  good  service  in  rolling  up  the  anti-slavery  votes 
from  the  seven  thousand  for  Birney,  in  1840,  to  the 
eighteen  hundred  thousand,  in  1860,  for  Abraham 
Lincoln. 


CHAPTER    III. 

THE    CRUSADER. 

AT  the  beginning  of  August,  1841,  an  anti-slavery 
convention  was  held  at  New  Bedford,  where  Douglass 
heard  not  only  Garrison,  but  Parker  Pillsbury,  a 
Universalist  clergyman  named  Bradburn,  and  other 
leading  Abolitionists  ;  and  he  became  so  much  inter 
ested  that  he  determined  to  take  a  holiday,  the  first 
he  had  that  summer,  and  go  with  his  wife  to  attend 
the  next  series  of  meetings  at  Nantucket.  He  had 
already  become  somewhat  noted  as  a  speaker  to  col 
ored  people  ;  but  he  felt  greatly  embarrassed  when, 
on  the  evening  of  Wednesday,  August  n,  as  is  re 
corded  in  the  "  Liberator,"  he  was  called  out,  for  the 
first  time  in  his  life,  to  address  a  white  audience. 
"  My  speech  on  this  occasion,"  he  says,  "  is  about  the 
only  one  I  ever  made  of  which  I  do  not  remember  a 
single  connected  sentence.  It  was  with  the  utmost 
difficulty  that  I  could  stand  erect,  or  that  I  could 
command  and  articulate  two  words  without  hesitation 
and  stammering.  I  trembled  in  every  limb."  He  has 
since  told  me,  that  he  did  manage  to  thank  the 
champions  of  his  race  for  their  devotion,  and  also  to 
express  his  hearty  sympathy  with  their  methods.  It 
was  then  too  late  in  the  evening  to  say  more.  The 
impression  he  made  was  so  favorable,  however,  that 
57 


58  FREDKRICK    DOUGLASS. 

he  was  persuaded  to  open  the  last  session  of  the 
Nantucket  convention  the  next  morning,  when,  as  is 
related  by  Garrison,  "  After  apologizing  for  his  ignor 
ance  and  reminding  the  audience,  that  slavery  is  a 
poor  school  for  the  human  intellect  and  heart,  he 
proceeded  to  narrate  some  of  the  facts  in  his  own 
history  as  a  slave,  and  in  the  course  of  his  speech  gave 
utterance  to  many  noble  thoughts  and  thrilling  reflec 
tions."  He  could  not  safely  tell  his  real  name,  or  his 
master's,  or  where  he  had  lived  in  the  South  ;  but 
according  to  Parker  Pillsbury,  he  succeeded  in  prov 
ing  that  he  had  been  there  by  giving  "a  most  side 
splitting  specimen  of  a  slave-holding  minister's  ser 
mon,"  on  the  text,  **  Servants,  obey  in  all  things  your 
masters."  A  passage  from  this  very  effective  parody 
will  be  found  in  the  next  chapter,  where  Miss  Holley 
quotes  it  as  she  heard  it,  two  years  later,  in  Buffalo. 
The  meetings  had  begun  tamely,  but  gradually 
gained  in  fervor  ;  and  now  "  The.  crowded  congrega 
tion  had  been  wrought  up  almost  to  enchantment,  as 
he  turned  over  the  terrible  apocalypse  of  his  expe 
riences  in  slavery."  Then  Garrison  arose ;  and  as 
Douglass  says,  his  speech  "  was  one  never  to  be  for 
gotten  by  those  who  heard  it.  Those  who  had  heard 
him  oftenest,  and  had  known  him  longest,  were 
astonished.  It  was  an  effort  of  unequalled  power, 
sweeping  down,  like  a  very  tornado,  every  opposing 
barrier."  Garrison  says  himself,  "  I  think  I  never 
hated  slavery  so  intensely  as  at  that  moment."  He 
began  by  declaring  that  Patrick  Henry  never  spoke 
more  eloquently  in  the  cause  of  liberty.  Then,  ac 
cording  to  Pillsbury,  he  asked,  "  Have  we  been  list 
ening  to  a  thing,  a  piece  of  property,  or  to  a  man  ? " 


THE    CRUSADER.  59 

"A  man  !  A  man  !  "  shouted  full  five  hundred  voices. 
"  And  should  such  a  man  be  held  a  slave  in  a  repub 
lican  and  Christian  land  ?"  "  No,  no  !  Never,  never  !" 
"  Shall  such  a  man  ever  be  sent  back  to  slavery  from 
the  soil  of  old  Massachusetts?"  shouted  Garrison, 
with  all  his  power  of  voice.  "  Almost  the  whole 
assembly  sprang  with  one  accord  to  their  feet,  and 
the  walls  and  roof  of  the  Athenaeum  seemed  to  shud 
der  with  the  '  No,  no  !  '  loud  and  long  continued  in 
the  wild  enthusiasm  of  the  scene.  As  soon  as  Gar 
rison  could  be  heard,  he  caught  up  the  acclaim,  and 
superadded  :  *  No  !  a  thousand  times  no  !  Sooner 
the  lightnings  of  heaven  blast  Bunker  Hill  monument, 
till  not  one  stone  shall  be  left  standing  upon  another.' " 
(Pillsbury,  "  Acts  of  the  Anti-Slavery  Apostles,"  pp. 

325-8.) 

Before  Douglass  returned  to  New  Bedford,  he 
accepted  an  invitation  from  Mr.  Collins,  agent  of  the 
Massachusetts  Anti-Slavery  Society,  to  enter  into  its 
service  as  a  lecturer,  and  go  to  and  fro  with  him,  tell 
ing  his  story  wherever  he  could  find  an  audience. 
His  salary  was  to  be  four  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  a 
year.  He  was  very  unwilling  at  first,  not  only 
because  he  would  be  dangerously  exposed  to  dis 
covery  and  arrest,  but  because  he  distrusted  his  own 
ability.  The  Abolitionists  insisted  on  his  enlisting  in 
their  forlorn  hope  ;  "  and  I  finally  consented  to  go 
out  for  three  months,  for  I  supposed  I  should  have 
got  to  the  end  of  my  story  and  my  usefulness  in  that 
length  of  time."  He  has  been  out  before  the  public, 
pleading  for  his  race,  almost  fifty  years,  and  he  has 
not  yet  got  to  the  end  of  his  usefulness. 

The  next  place  where  he  seems  to  have  attracted 


60  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

much  notice  was  Hingham,  where  he  spoke  at  the 
Plymouth  County  convention,  November  4.  Ac 
cording  to  an  article  copied  into  the  "  Liberator,"  from 
the  "  Hingham  Patriot,"  he  reminded  those  who  saw 
him  of  Spartacus,  the  rebel  gladiator,  as  presented  by 
Forrest.  "  A  man  of  his  shrewdness,  and  his  power, 
both  intellectual  and  physical,  must  be  poor  stuff, 
thought  we,  to  make  a  slave  of.  Any  way,  we  would 
not  like  to  be  his  master."  .  .  .  .  "  He  is  very  fluent 
in  the  use  of  language,  choice  and  appropriate  lan 
guage,  too  ;  and  talks  as  well,  for  all  we  could  see,  as 
men  who  have  spent  all  their  lives  over  books."  .  .  . 
"  His  master  valued  him  at  $2,000.  He  told  us  that 
he  could  distinguish  a  slave-holder  or  a  slave  by  the 
cast  of  his  eye,  the  moment  he  saw  one."  He  seems, 
even  then,  to  have  done  much  more  than  tell  his  own 
experience.  He  did,  it  is  true,  in  favoring  the  pre 
sentation  of  petitions  as  a  means  of  attracting  notice, 
relate  how  he  learned  himself  who  the  "  Bobolition- 
ists  "  were,  by  hearing  what  they  asked  of  Congress  ; 
but  he  went  on  to  express  his  decided  preference  for 
moral  suasion  over  political  action.  "  We  ought  to 
do  just  what  the  slave-holders  don't  want  us  to  do, 
that  is,  use  moral  suasion."  He  called  the  pledge  of 
the  North  to  return  fugitives  "  the  bulwark  of 
slavery  ;"  for  it  "discourages  very  many  from  mak 
ing  any  attempt  to  gain  their  freedom."  .  .  .  "  This  is 
the  Union  whose  dissolution  we  want  to  accomplish  ; 
and  he  is  no  true  Abolitionist  who  does  not  go  against 
this  Union.  The  South  cares  not  how  much  you  talk 
against  slavery  in  the  abstract.  They  will  agree  with 
you,  yet  they  will  cling  to  it  as  for  life  ;  and  it  is  this 
pledge,  binding  the  North  to  the  South,  on  which 


THE    CRUSADER.  6l 

they  rely  for  its  support."  This  is,  of  course,  simply 
what  he  had  been  taught  by  Garrison,  Phillips,  and 
Collins.  What  was  most  original  in  his  speeches  at 
this  time  was  the  zeal  with  which  he  lashed  the 
churches  of  the  North  for  their  alliance  with  those  in 
the  South. 

The  most  important  work  done  by  the  Abolitionists 
in  1841  was  in  Rhode  Island.  This  State  was  still 
under  the  charter  of  1663,  which  had  originally  been 
very  liberal,  but  had  now  become  plainly  unjust. 
The  voters  must  not  only  be  white,  but  must  also  be 
holders,  or  eldest  sons  of  holders,  of  real  estate,  so  that 
almost  two-thirds  of  the  men  were  disfranchised  ;  and 
the  majority  of  the  Representatives  were  elected  by  a 
portion  of  the  State  inhabited  by  only  about  one- 
third  of  its  citizens.  Thus  it  was  perfectly  possible 
for  fifteen  hundred  men  to  get  the  control  of  a  legis 
lature  which  ruled  over  fifty  thousand  adults.  About 
seven  hundred  of  the  disfranchised  men  were  colored. 

A  movement  to  enlarge  the  suffrage,  and  equalize 
the  representation,  began  in  1790,  was  renewed  in 
1829,  and  assumed  formidable  proportions  in  1841. 
The  Legislature  was  willing  to  make  some  changes, 
but  not  enough  to  satisfy  the  suffragists.  These 
Dorrites,  as  they  were  called,  on  account  of  being  led 
by  Mr.  T.  W.  Dorr,  were  mostly  Democrats,  and 
were  determined  to  have  full  justice  done  to  the 
white  man  at  once.  Those  of  them  who  wished  to 
do  something  for  the  colored  man  also  were  over 
ruled  by  the  others,  and  persuaded  to  make  a  com 
promise.  A  new  constitution  was  proposed  in 
November,  1841,  allowing  all  white  men  to  vote,  but 
postponing  the  question  of  enfranchising  colored 


62  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

people  for  decision  afterwards ;  and  all  who  would 
thus  be  entitled  to  the  ballot  were  invited  to  show 
themselves  at  the  polls  on  December  27,  28,  or  29. 

There  were  men  in  Rhode  Island  who  were  deter 
mined  that  the  negro  should  have  his  just  part  in 
whatever  reform  was  accomplished.  A  series  of  con 
ventions  was  arranged  for  December,  and  among  the 
companions  of  Douglass  was  one  of  whom  he  says 
"  No  man  thrilled  me  more  on  the  slavery  question 
than  Parker  Pillsbury."  There,  too,  were  Abby 
Kelley  and  Stephen  S.  Foster,  whose  conscience  was 
never  at  peace  unless  he  was  stirring  up  a  mob.  He 
was  now  carrying  out  his  own  favorite  plan,  of  rebuk 
ing  lukewarm  ministers  and  congregations  in  the 
midst  of  what  they  called  public  worship,  with  such 
success  that  even  he  was  satisfied.  Again  and  again 
he  was  dragged  out  by  deacons  and  class-leaders. 
His  collar  was  torn  off  by  excited  Quakers  in  Lynn, 
and  he  had  been  put  in  prison  several  times  before  he 
was  ejected,  in  September,  1842,  from  the  City  Hall  in 
Portland,  with  only  one  tail  left  on  his  long  coat. 
How  he  spoke  to  opponents  may  be  imagined  from 
this  fact.  A  number  of  Methodist  ministers  were  led, 
partly  by  sympathy  and  partly  by  curiosity,  into  one 
of  the  anti-slavery  conventions  in  Boston.  Foster 
recognized  their  peculiar  costume,  and  began  his 
speech  thus :  "  Is  there  a  single  member  of  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church  within  the  sound  of  my 
voice,  who  dares  deny  that  he  is  a  villain?"  His 
three  companions  in  Rhode  Island  were  not  so  fond 
of  church-work  ;  but  the  violence  of  the  mob  was 
increased  by  prejudice  against  the  color  of  Douglass 
and  the  sex  of  Miss  Kelley.  I  cannot  but  feel  indig- 


THE    CRUSADER.  63 

nant,  even  now,  when  I  think  of  the  foul  words  and 
rotten  eggs  that  were  hurled  at  her  of  whom  Lowell 
wrote  thus  : 

"  A  Judith  there,  turned  Quakeress, 

Sits  Abby  in  her  simple  dress. 
******* 
No  nobler  gift  of  heart  or  brain, 
No  life  more  white  from  spot  or  stain, 
Was  e'er  on  Freedom's  altar  laid 
Than  hers — the  simple  Quaker  maid." 

Convention  after  convention  was  mobbed,  but  still 
the  friends  of  equal  suffrage  went  on  pointing  out  the 
black  spot  in  the  Dorr  constitution.  Its  supporters 
were  indignant,  and  its  opponents  rejoiced  to  see  the 
suffragists  at  war  among  themselves.  Of  the  last  of 
these  conventions,  and  one  of  the  noisiest,  that  held 
in  Providence,  while  the  vote  was  being  taken  on  the 
merits  of  the  new  plan,  we  have  the  following  descrip 
tion,  from  the  pen  of  Mr.  N.  P.  Rogers,  who  was  mak 
ing  the  "  Herald  of  Freedom,"  published  at  Concord, 
New  Hampshire,  a  noble  ally  of  the  "  Liberator"  : 

"  Friday  evening  \vas  chiefly  occupied  by  colored  speakers. 
The  fugitive  Douglass  was  up  when  we  entered.  This  is  an  ex 
traordinary  man.  He  was  cut  out  for  a  hero.  In  a  rising  for 
liberty,  he  would  have  been  a  Toussaint  or  a  Hamilton.  He 
has  the  '  heart  to  conceive,  the  head  to  contrive,  and  the  hand 
to  execute.'  A  commanding  person — over  six  feet,  we  should 
say,  in  height,  and  of  most  manly  proportions.  His  head  would 
strike  a  phrenologist  amid  a  sea  of  them  in  Exeter  Hall,  and  his 
voice  would  ring  like  a  trumpet  in  the  field.  Let  the  South  con 
gratulate  herself  that  he  is  a  fugitive.  It  would  not  have  been 
safe  for  her,  if  he  had  remained  about  the  plantations  a  year  or 
two  longer.  Douglass  is  his  fugitive  name.  He  did  not  wear 


64  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

it  in  slavery.  We  don't  know  why  he  assumed  it,  or  who  be 
stowed  it  on  him — but  there  seems  fitness  in  it,  to  his  com 
manding  figure  and  heroic  port.  As  a  speaker  he  has  few 
equals.  It  is  not  declamation — but  oratory,  power  of  de 
bate.  He  watches  the  tide  of  discussion  with  the  eye  of  the 
veteran,  and  dashes  into  it  at  once  with  all  the  tact  of  the  forum 
or  the  bar.  He  has  wit,  argument,  sarcasm,  pathos — all  that 
first-rate  men  show  in  their  master  efforts.  His  voice  is  highly 
melodious  and  rich,  and  his  enunciation  quite  elegant ;  and  yet 
he  has  been  but  two  or  three  years  out  of  the  house  of  bondage. 
We  noticed  that  he  had  strikingly  improved  since  we  had  heard 
him  at  Dover  in  September.  We  say  thus  much  of  him,  for  he 
is  esteemed  by  our  multitude  as  of  an  inferior  race.  We  should 
like  to  see  him  before  any  New  England  legislature  or  bar,  and 
let  him  feel  the  freedom  of  the  anti-slavery  meeting,  and  see 
what  would  become  of  his  inferiority.  Yet,  he  is  a  thing,  in 
American  estimate.  He  is  the  chattel  of  some  pale-faced 
tyrant.  How  his  owner  would  cower  and  shiver  to  hear  him 
thunder  in  an  anti-slavery  hall.  How  he  would  shrink  away, 
with  his  infernal  Whip,  from  his  flaming  eye  when  kindled  with 
anti-slavery  emotion.  And  the  brotherhood  of  thieves,  the 
posse,  comitatus  of  divines,  we  wish  a  hecatomb  or  two  of  the 
proudest  and  flintiest  of  them,  were  obliged  to  hear  him  thun 
der  for  human  liberty,  and  lay  the  enslavement  of  his  people  at 
their  doors.  They  would  tremble  like  Belshazzar.  Poor  Way- 
land,  we  wish  he  could  have  been  pegged  to  a  seat  in  the  Frank 
lin  Hall  the  evening  the  colored  friends  spoke.  His  '  limitations  ' 
would  have  abandoned  him  like  the  '  baseless  fabric  of  a  vision.' 
Sanderson,  of  New  Bedford,  Cole,  of  Boston,  and  Stanley, 
of  North  Carolina,  followed  Douglass.  They  all  displayed  ex 
cellent  ability."  .  .  .  "  These  are  the  inferior  race,  these  young 
black  men,  who,  ten  years  ago,  would  have  been  denied  en 
trance  into  such  an  assembly  of  whites,  except  as  waiters  or 
fiddlers.  Their  attempts  at  speaking  would  have  been  met  with 
jeers  of  astonishment.  It  would  have  amazed  the  superior  race 
as  the  ass's  speech  did  Balaam.  Now  they  mingle  with 
applause  in  the  debates  with  Garrison,  and  Foster,  and  Phillips. 


THE    CRUSADER.  65 

Southern  slavery — '  hold  thine  own  ' — when  the  kindred  of  your 
victims  are  thus  kindling  Northern  enthusiasm  on  the  platform 
of  liberty  and  free  debate." 

A  series  of  events  in  1842,  which  attracted  much 
attention  at  the  time,  justified  fully  the  course  pursued 
by  the  Abolitionists  against  the  Dorrites.  These  latter 
attempted,  merely  as  agents  of  the  popular  will,  and 
without  any  sanction  from  the  laws  of  the  land,  to 
substitute  the  new  constitution  for  the  old  one,  and 
make  their  leader  Governor.  President  Tyler  was 
appealed  to  by  the  lawful  Governor,  and  promised 
him  the  support  of  the  nation.  Dorr  tried  to  seize 
upon  the  administration  by  force  ;  but  most  of  the 
leading  citizens,  including  his  father  and  brother, 
took  up  arms  against  him  ;  his  most  influential  sup 
porters  deserted  him;  the  cannons  which  he  attempted 
to  discharge  with  his  own  hands  against  the  state 
troops,  were  found  to  be  primed  with  wet  paper  ;  and 
he  was  soon  obliged  to  disband  his  adherents.  The 
law  and  order  party,  who  were  nicknamed  Algerines, 
on  account  of  their  severity,  made  their  victory  per 
manent,  by  enacting,  before  the  end  of  1842,  the  con 
stitution  which  was  in  force  until  very  recently,  and 
which  has  admitted  black  men  to  vote  on  the  same 
terms  as  white,  the  property  qualification  being  re 
duced  so  far  as  to  allow  any  citizen  to  vote  who  would 
pay  a  tax  of  one  dollar,  and  who  had  resided  two 
years  in  the  State. 

These  details  are  important,  because  this  expe 
rience,  of  the  advantage  of  acting  in  harmony  with  our 
national  spirit  of  respect  for  the  laws  and  for  the 
magistrates  elected  under  them,  may  .have  done 
something  to  prepare  Douglass  for  breaking  with  the 


66  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Garrisonian  disunionists,  as  he  ultimately  did.  At 
this  time,  however,  he  was  completely  carried  away 
by  his  admiration  for  the  enthusiasts,  who  gave  their 
lives  to  the  emancipation  of  his  race,  and  who  were 
free  from  that  prejudice  against  any  association  with 
colored  people,  which  was  then  almost  universal  at 
the  North.  He  \vas  surprised  and  delighted  at  the 
friendly  welcome  they  gave  him  when  he  came  to 
Boston  in  January,  1842.  The  first  house  in  the  city, 
where  he  was  welcomed  as  a  guest,  was  that  of  one 
of  the  few  members  of  the  Liberty  party,  Dr.  Henry 
I.  Bowditch,  who  was,  he  says,  "  the  first  of  his  color 
who  ever  treated  me  as  if  I  were  a  man."  This  organ 
ization  was  not,  however,  handled  very  tenderly  in 
the  speech  which  he  delivered  before  the  Massachu 
setts  Society  in  the  Melodeon,  on  Wednesday,  January 
26.  On  Thursday  evening  he  helped  Garrison,  Phil 
lips,  Rogers,  and  Abby  Kelley  take  advantage  of  the 
convention's  having  been  invited  to  occupy  the  Re 
presentatives'  Hall,  in  the  State  House,  to  pass  a 
resolution  declaring  "  That  Massachusetts  is  degraded 
and  dishonored  by  her  connection  with  Southern  slav 
ery;  that  this  connection  is  not  only  dishonorable,  but 
in  the  highest  degree  criminal ;  and  that  it  must  be 
broken  up,  at  whatever  sacrifice  or  hazard."  If  the 
meaning  of'these  words  was  not  plain  enough,  it  was 
made  so  twenty-four  hours  afterward. 

The  next  evening,  Friday,  January  28,  an  audience 
of  four  thousand  people  was  collected  in  Faneuil  Hall, 
to  demand  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of 
Columbia.  Garrison  presided  ;  and,  among  the  reso 
lutions  which  were  adopted,  was  one  declaring  that 
"  The  American  Union  is  such  only  in  form,  but  not 


THE    CRUSADER.  67 

in  substance,  a  hollow  mockery  instead  of  a  glorious 
reality."  This  action  was  taken  with  the  hearty  sup 
port  of  both  Phillips  and  Douglass.  The  latter  enliv 
ened  the  proceedings  by  giving  his  very  funny  imita 
tion  of  the  way  in  which  slave-holding  clergymen  would 
exhort  servants  to  obey  their  masters.  His  mimicry  of 
the  Southern  preacher's  whine  was  irresistibly  comical. 
This  sermon  was  often  delivered  by  him  in  county 
conventions  and  other  local  meetings.  His  conscience 
was  clear  in  the  use  of  this  weapon  ;  for  he  was  con 
vinced,  to  quote  a  resolution  which  he  introduced  at 
Worcester,  January  6,  1842,  that,  "  The  sectarian  organ 
izations  of  this  country,  called  churches,  are,  in  sup 
porting  slavery,  upholding  a  system  of  theft,  adultery, 
and  murder;  and  it  is  the  duty  of  Abolitionists  to 
expose  their  true  character  before  the  public."  His 
own  attempts  to  get  a  chance  to  plead  for  his  race  in 
the  pulpit  were  often  unsuccessful  ;  and  he  tells  me 
that  "  When  I  asked  for  a  church  and  the  minister 
said,  *  Brother  Douglass,  I  don't  know  about  this.  I 
must  ask  the  Lord.  Let  us  pray,'  I  always  knew  I 
should  not  get  it."  He  used  to  say  in  his  early  lec 
tures,  that  he  had  offered  many  prayers  for  freedom  ; 
but  he  did  not  get  it,  until  he  prayed  with  his  legs. 
His  dissatisfaction  with  the  clergy  even  led  him  to 
sing  the  parody  on  a  familiar  hymn,  about  being 
saved  from  a  burning  hell,  and  dwelling  with  Im- 
manuel  "in  heavenly  union." 

"  Come,  saints  and  sinners,  hear  me  tell, 
How  pious  priests  whip  Jack  and  Nell, 
And  women  buy,  and  children  sell, 
And  preach  all  sinners  down  to  hell, 

And  sing  of  heavenly  union. 


68  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

"  They'll  bleat  and  baa,  dona  like  goats 
Gorge  down  black  sheep,  and  strain  at  motes, 
Array  their  backs  in  fine  black  coats, 
Then  seize  their  niggers  by  the  throats, 

And  choke  for  heavenly  union. 

"  They'll  church  you,  if  you  sip  a  dram, 
And  damn  you,  if  you  steal  a  lamb, 
Yet  rob  old  Tony,  Doll,  and  Sam, 
Of  human  rights,  and  bread  and  ham, 

Kidnappers'  heavenly  union. 

"  They'll  loudly  talk  of  Christ's  reward, 
And  bind  his  image  with  a  cord, 
And  scold,  and  swing  the  lash  abhorred, 
And  sell  their  brother  in  the  Lord, 

To  hand-cuffed  heavenly  union. 

"  They'll  read  and  sing  a  sacred  song, 
And  make  a  prayer  both  loud  and  long, 
And  teach  the  right,  and  do  the  wrong, 
Hailing  the  brother,  sister  throng, 
With  words  of  heavenly  union. 


"  They'll  raise  tobacco,  corn,  and  rye, 
And  drive,  and  thieve,  and  cheat  and  lie, 
And  lay  up  treasure  in  the  sky, 
By  making  switch  and  cowskin  fly, 
In  hope  of  heavenly  union. 

"  They'll  crack  old  Tony  on  the  skull, 
And  preach  and  roar  like  Basham  bull, 
Or  braying  ass,  of  mischief  full, 
Then  seize  old  Jacob  by  the  wool, 
And  pull  for  heavenly  union. 


THE    CRUSADER.  69 

"  A  roaring,  ranting,  sleek  man-thief, 
Who  lived  on  mutton,  veal,  and  beef, 
Yet  never  would  afford  relief, 
To  needy,  sable  sons  of  grief, 

Was  big  with  heavenly  union. 

" '  Love  not  the  world,'  the  preacher  said, 
And  winked  his  eye,  and  shook  his  head. 
He  seized  on  Torn,  and  Dick,  and  Ned, 
Cut  short  their  meat,  and  clothes,  and  bread, 
Yet  still  loved  heavenly  union. 

"  Another  preacher,  whining,  spoke, 
Of  one  whose  heart  for  sinners  broke. 
He  tied  old  Nanny  to  an  oak, 
And  drew  the  blood  at  every  stroke, 
And  prayed  for  heavenly  union. 

"  Two  others  ope'd  their  iron  jaws, 
And  waved  their  children-stealing  paws. 
There  sat  their  children  in  gewgaws  ! 
By  stinting  negroes'  backs  and  maws, 
They  kept  up  heavenly  union." 

The  "  Liberator,"  of  February  25,  contains  this  little 
paragraph  :  "  Will  Frederick  Douglass  inform  the 
general  agent  of  his  whereabouts  ? "  During  the 
next  three  months  he  seems  to  have  spoken  almost 
every  night  in  Massachusetts.  His  attacks  on  clerical 
conservatism,  and  on  the  color  prejudice,  were  heard 
with  delight  ;  but  the  attempts  made  by  him  and  his 
associates  to  pledge  their  hearers  to,  disunion,  did 
not  by  any  means  meet  with  invariable  success.  He 
was  indebted  to  the  members  of  the  Hopedale  Com 
munity  for  a  chance  to  speak  at  Milford,  after  having 


70  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

been  denied  a  hearing.  They  told  him,  "  We  will  go 
there  with  you  to-night,  and  you  shall  have  forty  of  us 
to  hear  you  at  all  events."  That  night  the  Milford  peo 
ple  not  only  allowed  him  to  speak  to  them  in  the  town 
hall,  but  kept  as  still  as  mice  ;  and  there  never  after 
ward  was  any  difficulty  about  his  getting  a  hearing 
there.  Among  other  places  in  Massachusetts  where 
he  spoke,  early  in  1842,  were  Salem,  Andover,  and 
Lexington. 

When  the  American  Society  held  its  annual  May 
convention  in  New  York,  Douglass,  Phillips,  and 
Abby  Kelley  tried  to  carry  a  resolution  to  the  effect 
that  "  The  cause  of  human  rights  imperatively 
demands  the  dissolution  of  the  American  Union." 
They  failed,  although  two  hundred  and  fifty  Garri- 
sonians  had  come  in  a  body  from  New  England. 
Garrison  himself  had  thought  it  better,  on  account  of 
the  open  opposition  of  the  managers  of  this  society, 
to  send  only  a  letter.  During  the  anti-slavery  con 
vention,  which  now  formed  one  of  the  May  meetings 
in  Boston,  a  fortnight  after  those  in  New  York, 
Phillips  brought  forward  a  resolution,  calling  the 
Union  "a  rope  of  sand."  Abolitionism  was  now 
rapidly  becoming  synonymous  with  disunionism  in 
Massachusetts,  although  there  were  still  many  thor 
oughly  loyal  and  sagacious  friends  of  the  slave,  like 
Whittier,  who  now,  according  to  an  opinion  expressed 
by  the  editor  of  the  "Liberator,"  on  August  12,  had 
become  "incapable  of  doing  anything  important  for 
the  cause."  .  .  .  "  Politics  will  complete  his  ruin  !  " 

Probably  it  was  dislike  of  disunionism  which 
brought  down  a  shower  of  stones  and  brickbats  on 
that  same  day  in  August,  at  Nantucket,  upon  Mr. 


THE    CRUSADER.  7  I 

Douglass  and  his  companions.  Forty-eight  hours 
before  he  had  exposed  the  short-comings  of  the 
clergy  in  his  most  effective  manner  ;  his  mimicry  is 
said  to  have  been  very  amusing  ;  and  there  were 
probably  friends  of  the  Church  in  the  mob.  The 
year  between  his  two  visits  to  the  island  had  made 
him  a  terror  to  all  not  in  the  anti-slavery  ranks.  Even 
then  he  was  as  irresistible  in  making  men  swear  as  in 
making  them  laugh.  One  thing  also  he  could  do 
better  than  any  other  of  the  anti-slavery  orators,  even 
Phillips.  He  could  make  people  cry  ;  and  he  seldom 
spoke  long  before  he  could  see  "  the  white  flags 
wave."  He  had  by  this  time  ceased  to  confine  him 
self  to  telling  his  experience,  and  mimicking  sermons 
and  hymns.  He  now  exposed  the  essential  wicked 
ness  of  slavery,  as  well  as  the  guilt  of  the  North  in 
conniving  at  it,  with  such  power  and  skill  that  his 
hearers  found  it  hard  to  believe  that  he  had  grown 
up  outside  of  the  influence  of  schools  and  books. 
Mr.  Collins  began  to  fear  that  he  would  no  longer  be 
taken  for  a  fugitive  slave  ;  and  he  was  advised  not  to 
speak  such  good  English,  but  to  use  as  much  as  he 
could  of  the  plantation  accent. 

Soon  after  revisiting  Nantucket,  he  followed  Col 
lins  and  Abby  Kelley  into  the  region  where  he  was 
afterward  to  spend  twenty  of  his  most  useful  years. 
He  spoke  for  the  first  time  at  Rochester,  N.  Y.,  on 
August  30.  It  was,  I  think,  on  his  first  visit  to 
Western  New  York,  that  this  little  incident  occurred 
at  Victor,  where  he  spoke  on  September  6.  He  was 
constantly  annoyed  in  hotels,  steamboats,  and  railway 
cars  by  the  prejudice  against  his  color,  and  never  let 
a  chance  slip  of  rebuking  it.  He  was  now  invited  to 


72  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

eat  by  himself,  at  a  little  table  set  out  in  one  corner 
of  the  dining-room,  and  at  once  asked  the  landlord 
what  he  meant  by  it.  "  Why,  you  see,  Mr.  Doug 
lass,"  was  the  reply,  "  I  want  to  give  you  something 
a  little  better  than  the  rest."  The  joke  was  so  good 
that  he  could  only  say  that  he  did  not  wish  to  have 
any  distinction  made  for  his  benefit,  and  eat  his 
dinner  in  peace.  He  tried  at  this  time  to  speak  in 
Lima,  but  was  told  that  the  people  there  would  not 
let  him.  Instead  of  trying,  like  Foster,  to  make 
them  listen,  he  merely  said  :  "  The  Lord  can  abolish 
slavery  without  the  aid  of  Lima." 

The  first  place  to  which  he  was  sent  in  New  Hamp 
shire  was  Concord.  No  hall  or  church  could  be 
obtained  then,  in  1842,  for  an  anti-slavery  meeting,  so 
he  took  his  stand,  one  Sunday  afternoon,  at  the  cor 
ner  where  a  little  court  ran  out  from  one  of  the  prin 
cipal  streets,  and  collected  an  audience  by  appealing 
to  the  sympathies  of  people  on  their  way  to  church. 

Among  other  New  Hampshire  towns  which  he 
visited  that  summer  was  Pittsfield,  where  an  offer  to 
entertain  a  speaker  against  slavery  had  been  made  by 
a  subscriber  to  the  "  Liberator,"  named  Hilles.  This 
man's  principles  did  not  stand  the  sight  of  his  visitor's 
color,  and  he  could  not  eat  at  the  same  table  with  his 
guest.  They  did  unite  in  family  worship,  but  the 
next  morning  Mr.  Hilles  drove  off  to  church,  with 
two  vacant  seats  in  his  phaeton,  leaving  the  lecturer 
to  walk  two  miles  to  the  hall.  He  found  no  one 
there  to  introduce  him,  but  spoke  an  hour  or  two, 
and  then  paused  to  give  his  hearers  time  to  lunch. 
No  one  offered  him  a  morsel,  not  even  Mrs.  Hilles, 
who  was  in  the  audience.  One  o'clock  came  and  he 


THE    CRUSADER.  73 

made  his  second  speech  that  Sunday.  By  the  time 
he  had  spoken  he  was  very  hungry.  This  time  the 
people  dispersed  as  soon  as  he  had  finished.  He 
went  to  the  tavern  and  offered  to  pay  for  a  meal,  but 
was  told  that  "  We  don't  entertain  niggers."  He 
went  away  hungry,  and  chilly  also,  for  an  east  wind 
had  sprung  up,  and  rain  was  falling.  He  saw  people 
looking  at  him  from  their  comfortable  homes  as  if  he 
were  a  stray  bear.  At  last  he  went  into  the  grave 
yard,  where  he  "  felt  some  relief  in  contemplating  the 
resting-place  of  the  dead,  where  there  was  an  end  to 
all  distinctions  between  rich  and  poor,  white  and 
colored,  high  and  low." 

He  was  thinking  of  a  Great  Reformer,  who  had  not 
"  where  to  lay  his  head,"  when  a  gentleman  came  up 
and  asked  his  name.  "  You  do  not  seem  to  have  any 
place  to  stay  while  in  town.  Well,  I  am  not  an  Abo 
litionist,  I'm  a  Democrat,  but  I'm  a  man.  Come  with 
me  and  I'll  take  care  of  you."  Douglass  accepted 
with  thanks,  but  was  surprised  to  find,  before  they 
reached  the  house,  that  this  was  the  same  Democratic 
Senator  who  had  recently  had  a  clergyman  arrested 
in  the  pulpit  for  attacking  slavery,  and  imprisoned. 
As  soon  as  his  children  saw  them  enter  they  ran 
away,  screaming  "  Mother,  mother,  there  is  a  nigger 
in  the  house  ;  "  and  it  was  all  the  father  could  do  to 
quiet  them.  The  mother,  too,  was  evidently  much 
disturbed  ;  and  only  the  kind  assurances  of  Mr. 
Norris  kept  his  guest  from  going  back  to  the  ceme 
tery.  When  the  storm  had  subsided  he  ventured  to 
tell  the  lady  that  he  had  taken  cold,  and  asked  for  a 
little  sugar  and  water.  The  mother's  heart  was 
touched.  She  brought  him  what  he  wanted  with  her 


74  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

own  hands,  and  after  that  he  found  himself  fully 
welcome  at  his  adversary's  fireside.  He  spoke  at 
five,  and  for  the  fourth  and  last  time  at  seven.  After 
that  there  was  quite  a  contest  between  Mrs.  Norris 
and  Mrs.  Hilles,  as  to  which  should  entertain  him 
over  night.  He  decided  to  go  back  to  his  former 
quarters,  and  Mr.  Hilles  eagerly  offered  to  drive  him, 
saying,  "  I  kind  of  missed  you  this  morning."  The 
next  day  Douglass  was  carried  on  to  a  neighboring 
town  in  the  very  carriage  where  he  had  not  been 
permitted  to  ride  twenty-four  hours  before  ;  and  its 
owner  told  him  that  he  felt  it  more  of  an  honor  to 
do  this  for  him  than  for  the  President  of  the  United 
States. 

His  most  effective  theme  thus  far  had  been  the 
unfaithfulness  of  the  clergy  ;  but  he  and  the  other 
Abolitionists  were  fortunate  enough,  before  the  close 
of  1842,  to  find  an  issue  on  which  they  could  all  unite 
and  have  the  best  men  in  the  North  with  them.  A 
fugitive  from  Virginia,  named  Latimer,  was  arrested 
without  a  warrant,  at  his  master's  request,  under  a 
false  charge  of  theft,  by  men  who  pretended  to  act 
under  the  laws  of  Massachusetts,  and  was  confined  in 
the  same  jail  where  Garrison  had  found  a  refuge.  Not 
only  the  enemies  of  slavery  but  other  friends  of 
liberty  were  indignant.  On  Sunday,  October  30, 
all  the  clergymen  who  officiated  in  Boston  were 
requested  to  pray  for  the  prisoner,  and  also  to  read  a 
notice  of  a  mass-meeting  to  be  held  that  evening  in 
Faneuil  Hall.  Among  the  twenty-four  clergymen 
who  complied,  in  part  at  least,  may  be  mentioned  the 
honored  names  of  Father  Taylor,  Baron  Stow,  Clarke, 
Dr.  Lowell,  Sargent,  Waterston,  Neale,  and  Brown- 


THE    CRUSADER.  75 

son.  Among  the  twenty  who  would  not,  were  such 
eminent  ecclesiastics  as  Huntingdon,  Lothrop,  Gan 
nett,  Whittemore,  Blagden,  and  Nehemiah  Adams. 

Letters  of  cordial  sympathy  were  read  at  Faneuil 
Hall  that  night,  from  Bancroft  and  John  Quincy 
Adams,  and  Judge  Sewall  took  the  chair;  and  all  the 
Boston  ministers  appear  to  have  had  followers  in  the 
audience.  When  Mr.  Charles  L.  Remond,  a  colored 
man  who  had  been  brought  up  at  the  North  and  was 
doing  a  good  work  for  his  race,  stepped  forward  to 
address  the  meeting,  his  voice  was  drowned  by  shouts 
of  "  Sell  the  nigger."  Even  the  rioters  were  willing 
to  listen  to  Wendell  Phillips,  though  he  said:  "I 
know  I  am  speaking  to  the  white  slaves  of  the 
North."  Hisses  followed,  but  he  went  on,  "  Yes,  you 
dare  to  hiss  me,  of  course.  But  you  dare  not  break 
the  chain  which  binds  you  to  the  car  of  slavery." 
The  uproar  after  he  concluded  was  so  great,  that 
Douglass  is  said  to  have  stood  before  the  audience 
for  twenty  minutes,  making  passionate  gestures,  but 
not  succeeding  in  uttering  a  single  audible  word. 
Mrs.  Folsom  was  in  the  hall,  and  was  called  for,  as 
usual,  by  the  rioters  ;  but  this  time  she  was  saner 
than  they,  and  would  say  nothing.  Colored  women 
who  sat  in  the  gallery,  under  the  national  emblem  of 
Liberty,  were  stripped  of  their  shawls  and  bonnets, 
and  the  whole  scene  was  one  which  only  sympathy 
with,  slave-holders  could  have  produced  in  Boston  on 
Sunday  night.  It  is  pleasant  to  read  an  account  of  a 
much  more  successful  meeting  a  week  later,  in  the 
same  cause. 

On  November  8,  Mr.  Douglass  wrote  from  Lynn  to 
the  "  Liberator  :  " 


76  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

"DEAR  FRIEND  GARRISON  :  The  date  of  this  letter  finds 
me  quite  unwell.  I  have  for  a  week  past  been  laboring,  in 
company  with  Bro.  Charles  Remond,  in  New  Bedford,  with 
especial  reference  to  the  case  of  our  outraged  brother,  George 
Latimer,  and  speaking  almost  day  and  night,  in  public  and 
private.  .  .  .  On  Sunday  we  held  three  meetings  in  the  Town 
Hall.  ...  In  the  morning  we  had  quite  a  large  meeting,  at  the 
opening  of  which  I  occupied  about  an  hour  on  the  question 
whether  a  man  is  better  than  a  sheep.  .  .  .  Long  before  the 
drawling,  lazy  church  bells  commenced  sounding  their  deathly 
notes  that  afternoon,  mighty  crowds  were  making  their  way  to 
the  Town  Hall.  They  needed  no  bells  to  remind  them  of  their 
duty  to  bleeding  humanity.  .  .  .  As  I  gazed  upon  them  my 
soul  leaped  for  joy.  .  .  .  The  splendid  hall  was  brilliantly 
lighted  in  the  evening,  and  crowded  with  an  earnest,  listening 
audience.  ...  A  large  number  had  to  stand  during  the  meet 
ing,  which  lasted  about  three  hours  ;  where  the  standing  part 
of  the  audience  were  at  the  commencement  of  the  meeting, 
there  they  were  at  the  conclusion  of  it.  ...  Prejudice  against 
color  was  not  there.  .  .  .  We  wrere  all  on  a  level ;  every  one 
took  a  seat  just  where  he  chose  ;  there  was  neicher  man's 
side  nor  woman's  side  ;  white  pew  nor  black  pew  ;  but  all  seats 
were  free,  and  all  sides  free.  ...  I  again  took  the  stand,  and 
called  the  attention  of  the  meeting  to  the  case  of  Bro.  George 
Latimer,  which  proved  the  finishing  stroke  of  my  present  public 
work.  On  taking  my  seat  I  was  seized  with  a  violent  pain  in 
my  breast,  which  continued  till  morning,  and  with  occasional 
raising  of  blood.  ...  It  is  a  struggle  of  life  and  death  with  us 
just  now.  No  sword  that  can  be  used,  be  it  never  so  rusty, 
should  lay  in  its  scabbard.  Slavery,  our  enemy,  has  landed  in 
our  very  midst,  and  commenced  its  bloody  work.  ...  I  can 
sympathize  with  George  Latimer,  having  myself  been  cast  into  a 
miserable  jail,  on  suspicion  of  my  intending  to  do -what  he  has 
said  to  have  done,  viz.,  appropriating  my  own  body  to  my  own 
use.  My  heart  is  full ;  and  had  I  my  voice,  I  should  be  doing 
all  that  I  am  capable  of  for  Latimer's  redemption.  I  can  do 
but  little  in  any  department ;  but  if  one  department  is  more 


THE    CRUSADER.  77 

the  place  for  me  than  another,  that  one  is  before  the  people.  I 
can't  write  to  much  advantage,  having  never  had  a  day's 
schooling  in  my  life  ;  nor  have  I  ventured  to  give  publicity  to 
any  of  my  scribbling  before ;  nor  would  I  now,  but  for  my 
peculiar  circumstances. 

"  Your  grateful  friend, 

"  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS." 

It  is  a  great  pity  that  this  misfortune  marred  his 
day  of  triumph.  He  had  entered  New  Bedford  a 
penniless  fugitive,  fit  only  for  the  most  menial  tasks. 
He  left  it  a  popular  orator,  a  leader  of  the  people  in 
the  noblest  cause.  He  had  made  all  his  arrange 
ments  for  removing  to  Lynn  with  his  family,  which 
now  included  three  little  children,  and  he  succeeded 
in  carrying  out  his  plan  on  Monday  or  Tuesday.  His 
recovery  was  so  complete  that  he  was  able  to  sing 
the  parody  on  slave-holding  clergymen,  at  Essex,  the 
last  Sunday  of  the  month.  The  day  previous  he  had 
attempted  in  vain  to  amend  a  resolution  proposed 
there  by  one  of  the  leading  Abolitionists,  James  N. 
Buffum.  His  resolution  was  passed,  as  follows  : 
"  Resolved,  That  no  person  ought  to  be  considered  a 
Christian  unless  he  is  a  practical  Abolitionist."  The 
amendment  proposed  was  to  insert  the  words  "  who 
is  acquainted  with  the  principles  of  anti-slavery." 

Latimer  had,  by  this  time,  been  purchased  by  Dr. 
H.  I.  Bowditch  and  other  friends  of  the  slave  for  four 
hundred  dollars.  He  got  his  freedom  ;  his  master 
got  the  money  ;  and  the  Abolitionists  got  an  unusual 
amount  of  popular  sympathy.  Early  next  year  they 
presented,  at  the  State  House,  where  Hon.  Charles 
Francis  Adams  acted  in  their  behalf,  a  petition  with 
more  than  sixty  thousand  signatures,  asking  that 


78  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

fugitives  from  slavery  should  never  again  be  arrested 
by  town  or  city  officials,  nor  held  as  prisoners  in  the 
jails  of  this  commonwealth  ;  and  also  that  the  Con 
stitution  of  the  United  States  should  be  so  amended 
as  "  shall  forever  separate  the  people  of  Massachu 
setts  from  all  connection  with  slavery."  The  legis 
lature  made  it  a  penal  offence  for  any  magistrate  or 
executive  officer  of  the  State  to  help  arrest  fugitives, 
and  forbade  use  of  the  jails  for  confining  them.  The 
excitement  sprang  throughout  New  England  and 
into  Western  New  York.  The  opposition  to  the 
Fugitive  Slave  Bill  did  not  cease  until  it  was  repealed; 
and  this  was  certainly  one  of  the  wisest  parts  of  the 
great  anti-slavery  movement.  Nothing  which  its 
advocates  could  say  was  heard  so  willingly  by  the 
people,  as  the  call  to  protect  men  and  women  already 
at  the  North,  from  being  dragged  back  into  bondage. 
All  discussion  of  theories  was  tame  in  comparison 
with  appeals  for  individuals  seen  to  be  oppressed. 

The  Latimer  meetings  continued  to  be  held  during 
the  early  months  of  1843  ;  and  among  the  most  enthu 
siastic  speakers  was  Douglass.  He  was  also  a  sup 
porter  of  the  resolution,  passed  on  January  27,  by  the 
State  Society  in  Faneuil  Hall,  declaring  that  "The 
compact  between  the  North  and  the  South  is  a  cove 
nant  with  death  and  an  agreement  with  hell,"  and  that 
"  It  should  be  immediately  dissolved."  On  March  6, 
he  lectured  in  Amory  Hall,  Boston,  on  "  Slavery  as 
actually  existing  in  the  South."  Among  the  other 
speakers  in  this  course  were  Phillips,  Pierpont,  and 
Garrison. 

Fear  that  a  new  field  might  be  opened  for  slavery, 
by  the  annexation  of  Texas,  was  among  the  causes 


THE    CRUSADER.  79 

which  made  the  annual  meeting  of  the  American  So 
ciety  in  New  York,  on  May  9,  1843,  larger  than  any 
that  had  ever  been  held  before,  with  the  single  excep 
tion  of  1840.  Then  there  was  a  bitter  contest  between 
New  York  and  New  England.  Now  there  was  per 
fect  unanimity  ;  and  most  of  the  delegates  came  from 
the  West.  Some  of  the  friends  traveled  in  wagons 
from  Pennsylvania  and  Illinois,  holding  meetings 
along  the  road.  One  of  the  vehicles  thus  used  was 
named  the  "  Liberator,"  and  did  good  service  that 
same  summer  at  conventions  in  Ohio  and  Indiana. 
Douglass,  on  the  second  day,  spoke  thus  :  "  Such 
have  been  my  habits  of  life  as  to  instil  into  my  heart 
a  disposition  I  can  never  quite  shake  off,  to  cower 
before  the  white  man.  But  one  thing  I  can  do.  I 
can  represent  here  the  slave,  the  human  -chattel."  He 
then  introduced  a  resolution,  stating  that  "  The  anti- 
slavery  movement  is  the  only  earthly  hope  of  the 
American  slave."  "  Instead  of  being  regarded  as  a 
powerful  aid  to  abolition,"  he  continued,  "  it  is  far 
too  generally  viewed  as  retarding  that  event.  But 
this  is  a  grievous  error,  I  know  ;  for  I  speak  from 
experience."  .  .  .  "  Prior  to  this  movement,  Sir, 
the  slave  in  chains  had  no  hope  of  deliverance.  But 
when  he  heard  of  it,  hope  sprung  up  in  his  mind." 
.  .  .  "  I  knew,  I  felt  that  truth  was  above  error, 
that  right  was  above  wrong,  that  principle  was  above 
prejudice,  and  that  I  should  one  day  be  free."  .  .  . 
"  There  is  no  hope  for  the  slave  in  Church  or  State. 
But  this  Society  is  above  either  Church  or  State.  It 
is  moving  both  daily,  more  and  more." 

The  resolution  was  seconded  by  Abby  Kelley,  whom 
John  Neal,  who  was  one  of  the  audience,  describes  as 


8o  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

"  a  pleasant  Quakerish  woman,  with  a  white  shawl 
on,  the  smoothest  possible  hair,  the  smoothest  possible 
voice,  and  no  very  great  superabundance  of  action." 
A  more  sympathetic  observer  praises  her  "  fine  person, 
clear  blue  eye,  delicate  complexion,  fair  hair,  and 
lady-like  hands."  "  Mr.  Douglass,"  said  she,  "  is  free 
and  can  speak  for  himself  ;  but  his  sisters  are  still  in 
the  hands  of  the  outragers  ;  and  it  is  therefore  fit  that 
a  woman  should  stand  here  by  his  side." 


CHAPTER   IV. 
"CONFIDENT   AGAINST   THE   WORLD   IN   ARMS." 

WHAT  Shakespeare  says  of  his  Douglas,  ("  Henry 
IV.,"  Part  I,  Act  V,  Scene  I),  was  perfectly  true  of 
our  hero,  as  soon  as  he  got  over  the  embarrassment, 
caused  by  being  suddenly  brought  into  association 
with  gentlemen  and  ladies  whom  he  revered  even 
more  for  their  character  than  for  their  culture  and 
race.  He  had  not  resided  long  in  Lynn  before  he 
vindicated  his  rights,  by  main  force,  against  the 
Eastern  Railroad.  This  corporation  had  been  de 
nounced,  week  after  week,  in  the  "Traveller's  Direc 
tory  "  in  the  "  Liberator,"  for  "  an  odious  distinction 
on  account  of  color,  and  a  bullying  propensity  to  carry 
it  out."  The  passengers  had  fight  after  fight  with 
conductors  and  brakemen,  before  the  battle  of  which 
this  account  is  given  by  a  writer,  who  also  describes 
the  chief  combatant  : 

"  Mr.  Douglass  lived  in  Lynn  about  this  time.  He  was  not 
then  the  polished  orator  that  he  has  since  become,  but  even  at 
that  early  date  he  gave  promise  of  the  grand  part  he  was  to 
play  in  the  conflict  which  was  to  end  in  the  destruction  of  the 
system  that  had  so  long  cursed  his  race.  He  was  more  than 
six  feet  in  height ;  and  his  majestic  form,  as  he  rose  to  speak, 
straight  as  an  arrow,  muscular,  yet  lithe  and  graceful,  his 
flashing  eye,  and  more  than  all,  his  voice,  that  rivaled  Web- 
Si 


82  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

ster's  in  its  richness,  and  in  the  depth  and  sonorousness  of  its 
cadences,  made  up  such  an  ideal  of  an  orator  as  the  listeners 
never  forgot.  And  they  never  forgot  his  burning  words,  his 
pathos,  nor  the  rich  play  of  his  humor.  He  had  just  escaped 
from  the  '  house  of  bondage  ' ;  and  as  he  recited  his  experience 
as  a  slave,  his  sufferings  as  he  grew  old  enough  to  realize  the 
bitterness  of  his  lot,  his  alternate  hope  and  despair  as  he 
attempted  to  lift  the  veil  of  the  future — his  eyes  would  now 
flash  with  defiance,  and  now  grow  dim  with  emotions  he  could 
not  control ;  and  the  roll  of  his  splendid  voice,  as  he  hurled  his 
denunciations  against  the  infamous  system,  would  pass  to  the 
minor  key,  whose  notes  trembled  on  his  tongue.  Then,  with 
inimitible  mimicry,  he  would  give  a  droll  recital  of  some 
ludicrous  scene  in  his  experience  as  a  slave,  or  with  bitter  sar 
casm  he  would  tell  a  tale  of  insult  offered  by  some  upstart  who 
fancied  he  held  his  title  to  manhood  by  the  whiteness  of  his 
skin  ;  and  then  again,  with  flashing  eye,  he  would  hurl  his 
indignation  at  '  wickedness  in  high  places,'  against  men  who, 
under  the  pretended  sanction  of  religion,  defended  the  '  infernal 
institution,'  whose  horrors  had  filled  his  days  with  dread,  and 
his  night  dreams  with  terror.  An  incident,  which  the  writer 
heard  him  relate  in  his  peculiar  manner,  half  amusing  and  half 
indignant  at  the  outrage  he  had  suffered,  occurred  about  this 
time.  Its  recital  will  sound  strangely  some  years  hence. 
These  were  the  days  when  '  negro  cars '  were  on  our  railroads. 
Mr.  Douglass  and  his  friend,  James  N.  Buffum,  having  pur 
chased  their  tickets,  entered  one  of  the  cars,  not  taking  special 
pains  to  get  into  the  negro  car.  It  was  on  the  Eastern  Rail 
road,  and  they  were  bound  for  Newburyport.  The  conductor 
came  along  and,  spying  Mr.  Douglass,  asked  him  what  he  was 
in  that  car  for.  Mr.  Douglass  replied  in  substance,  that  he 
wanted  to  go  to  a  certain  place,  and  thought  that  the  most 
direct  way.  The  conductor  ordered  Mr.  Douglass  to  leave. 
Mr.  Douglass  assured  the  conductor  that  he  was  satisfied  with 
his  seat,  and  excused  himself  from  accepting  the  invitation. 
The  conductor  called  to  his  aid  two  or  three  brakemen,  who 
proceeded  to  make  a  demonstration,  that  looked  as  though  Mr. 


"CONFIDENT  AGAINST  THE  WORLD  IN  ARMS."      83 

Douglass  was  to  be  taken  from  the  car,  without  gaining  the 
consent  of  his  will  or  the  aid  of  his  limbs.  It  was  amusing  to 
hear  Mr.  Douglass  relate  this  part  of  the  scene.  '  When  they 
took  hold  of  me,'  said  Mr.  Douglass,  with  a  broad  grin,  '  I  felt 
my  hands  instinctively  clutch  the  arms  of  the  seat  where  I  sat, 
and  I  seemed  to  be  very  firmly  attached  to  the  place.'  But  two 
or  three  stout  brakemen  were  too  much  for  young  Douglass, 
though  he  had  the  grip  of  a  giant  ;  or  rather,  they  were  too 
strong  to  deal  with  the  kind  of  car  furniture  then  in  use.  Doug 
lass  left  the  car,  and  left  behind  him  an  empty  space  in  one 
end  of  it  where  seats  had  been." — (Johnson's  "  Sketches  of 
Lynn,"  pp.  230-232.) 

The  amount  of  damage  was  to  great  that  the 
superintendent  refused,  during  two  or  three  days,  to 
allow  any  trains  to  stop  for  passengers  at  Lynn, 
while  the  people  took  part  with  their  townsman. 
Some  of  them  remonstrated  with  the  official  against 
his  "Jim  Crow  Car,"  but  he  replied  that  they  ought 
not  to  object  to  it,  so  long  as  the  churches  had  negro 
pews.  The  only  other  railroad  in  the  State  which 
made  this  distinction  was  that  on  which  Wendell 
Phillips  rebuked  the  prejudice,  in  a  way  described  as 
follows,  in  "  Thoughts  and  Recollections  of  the  Anti- 
Slavery  Conflict,"  a  lecture  not  yet  published,  by 
Frederick  Douglass  : 

"  I  knew  him,  after  delivering  his  famous  lecture  on  '  The 
Lost  Arts  '  in  New  Bedford,  Mass.,  more  than  forty  years 
ago,  enjoying  the  hospitality  of  the  wealthiest  citizens  of  that 
opulent  city,  and  moving  in  its  most  refined  society,  to  alight 
at  the  railroad  station  from  a  splendid  carriage,  walk  deliber 
ately  down  the  platform,  past  the  long  line  of  elegantly  cush 
ioned  and  richly  ornamented  coaches,  till  he  came  to  a  little 
box  next  the  engine,  exposed  to  dust,  sparks,  and  smoke,  and 


84  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

there  take  his  seat  for  Boston,  because  that  miserable  little 
box — then  known  as  the  Jim  Crow  Car — was  exclusively  set 
apart  for  negroes." 

Douglass  kept  on  fighting  against  this  indignity, 
until  it  was  abolished.  After  that  he  was,  he  says,  a 
gainer  by  the  color  prejudice  ;  for  it  usually  gave 
him  the  whole  of  a  seat.  He  did,  however,  at  first, 
feel  annoyed  at  being  shunned  ;  and  he  mentions 
gratefully,  ("  Bondage  and  Freedom,"  p.  403,)  how 
Governor  Briggs  once  asked  for  the  vacant  place,  and 
behaved  so  courteously  that  no  seat  was  more  sought 
after  in  that  car.  Another  time,  he  found  only  a 
single  place  left  empty  on  a  crowded  train,  and  asked 
the  man  who  sat  next  to  it,  to  let  him  come  in. 

"  My  fellow-passenger  gave  me  a  look,  made  up  of  reproach 
and  indignation,  and  asked  me  why  I  should  come  to  that 
particular  seat.  I  assured  him,  in  the  gentlest  manner,  that,  of 
all  others,  this  \vas  the  seat  for  me.  Finding  that  I  was 
actually  about  to  sit  down,  he  sang  out,  '  Oh,  stop,  stop  !  and 
let  me  get  out.'  Suiting  the  action  to  the  word,  up  the 
agitated  man  got,  and  sauntered  to  the  other  end  of  the  car, 
and  was  compelled  to  stand  for  most  of  the  way  thereafter. 
Half-way  to  New  Bedford,  or  more,  Colonel  Clifford,  recog 
nizing  me,  left  his  seat,  and  not  having  seen  me  before  since  I 
ceased  to  wait  on  him  (in  everything  except  hard  arguments 
against  his  pro-slavery  position),  apparently  forgetful  of  his 
rank,  manifested  in  greeting  me  something  of  the  feeling  of  an 
old  friend.  This  demonstration  was  not  lost  on  the  gentleman 
whose  dignity  I  had  an  hour  before  most  seriously  offended. 
Colonel  Clifford  was  known  to  be  about  the  most  aristocratic 
gentleman  in  Bristol  County ;  and  it  was  evidently  thought  I 
must  be  somebody,  else  I  should  not  have  been  thus  noticed  by 
a  person  so  distinguished.  Sure  enough,  after  Colonel  Clifford 
left  me,  I  found  myself  surrounded  by  friends  ;  and  among  the 


"CONFIDENT    AGAINST    THE    WORLD    IN    ARMS."        85 

number  my  offended  friend  stood  nearest,  and  with  an  apology 
for  his  rudeness,  which  I  could  not  resist,  although  it  was  one 
of  the  lamest  ever  offered." 

About  this  time  Mr.  Douglass,  on  finding  no  church 
open  to  him  at  Concord,  New  Hampshire,  told  his 
audience,  in  the  dirty  Town  Hall,  that  he  was  not  a 
fugitive  from  slavery,  but  still  a  fugitive  in  slavery, 
and  that  it  was  because  their  religion  sanctified  the 
system.  This  was  on  Sunday  afternoon  ;  and  that 
evening,  according  to  Mr.  Rogers,  after  relating  his 
sufferings  and  struggles,  "  in  a  somewhat  suppressed 
and  hesitating  way,  interesting  all  the  while  for  its 
facts,  but  dullish  in  manner,  he  closed  his  slave  narra 
tive,  and  gradually  let  out  the  outraged  humanity 
that  was  laboring  in  him,  in  indignant  and  terrible 
speech.  It  was  not  what  you  could  describe  as  ora 
tory  or  eloquence.  It  was  sterner,  darker,  deeper 
than  these.  It  was  the  volcanic  outbreak  of  human 
nature,  long  pent  up  in  slavery  and  at  last  bursting  its 
imprisonment.  It  was  the  storm  of  insurrection  ;  and 
I  could  not  but  think,  as  he  stalked  to  and  fro  on  the 
platform,  roused  up  like  the  Numidian  lion,  how  that 
terrible  voice  of  his  would  ring  through  the  pine 
glades  of  the  South,  in  the  day  of  her  visitation."  .  .  . 
"There  was  great  oratory  in  his  speech,  but  more  of 
dignity  and  earnestness  than  what  we  call  eloquence. 
He  was  not  up  as  a  speaker,  performing.  He  was  an 
insurgent  slave,  taking  hold  on  the  rights  of  speech, 
and  charging  on  his  tyrants  the  bondage  of  his  race. 
One  of  our  editors  ventured  to  cross  his  path  by  a 
rash  remark.  He  had  better  have  run  upon  a  lion. 
It  was  fearful,  but  magnificent,  to  see  how  magnani 
mously  and  lion-like  the  royal  fellow  tore  him  to 


86  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

pieces,    and  left  his    untouched  fragments  scattered 
around  him." 

The  members  of  the  New  England  Anti-Slavery 
Convention,  which  came  together  in  Boston,  May  30, 
1843,  were  greatly  encouraged  by  the  strong  opposi 
tion  made  in  the  legislature  to  the  "  Jim  Crow  Car," 
by  the  permission  of  intermarriage,  by  the  passage  in 
Vermont,  as  well  as  in  Massachusetts,  of  laws  to  protect 
fugitives,  and  by  the  large  attendance  from  the  West  in 
New  York  two  weeks  previous.  It  was  agreed  that 
one  hundred  conventions  should  be  held  in  various 
States  ;  and  the  ablest  of  the  speakers  engaged  was 
Douglass,  who  "  never  entered  upon  any  work  with 
more  heart  and  hope." 

The  first  meetings,  held  that  July  in  Vermont,  were 
thinly  attended  ;  and  the  students  of  the  Congrega- 
tionalist  College,  at  Middlebury,  covered  the  town  with 
placards,  describing  him  as  an  escaped  convict  from 
the  State  prison,  and  doing  equal  justice  to  his  com 
panions.  Thence  they  went  to  Western  New  York, 
where  these  disunionists  were  naturally  regarded  with 
some  suspicion  by  the  leaders  of  the  Liberty  party, 
who  were  re-organizing  for  the  presidential  campaign 
of  1844,  with  a  vigor  which  crushed  the  hopes  of  one 
of  their  most  formidable  opponents,  Henry  Clay,  and 
insured  a  much  needed  and  highly  beneficial  reduc 
tion  of  the  tariff.  At  their  headquarters,  Syracuse,  no 
church  or  hall  could  at  first  be  had  by  the  Garrison- 
ians.  Some  of  them  could  think  of  nothing  better 
than  shaking  off  the  dust  from  their  feet  against  the 
wicked  city  ;  but  the  Douglass  was  not  to  be  defeated 
thus.  On  the  morning  appointed  for  opening  the 
mass-meeting,  July  31,  he  took  his  stand  under  a  little 


"CONFIDENT  AGAINST  THE  WORLD  IN  ARMS."      87 

tree,  in  the  corner  of  the  park,  and  began  with  an 
audience  of  five  people.  There  were  five  hundred 
at  the  close  of  the  afternoon  meeting  ;  and  they  had 
the  use  of  an  abandoned  church  for  the  remainder  of 
the  convention,  which  continued  three  days  longer. 

Before  it  closed,  there  broke  loose,  from  an  unex 
pected  quarter,  a  storm  which  might  easily  have 
wrecked  Garrisonianism.  Mr.  John  A.  Collins,  who 
engaged  Douglass  at  Nantucket,  two  years  before,  to 
work  for  the  Massachusetts  society,  was  its  general 
agent  for  five  years,  and  had  shown  great  energy, 
especially  in  packing  conventions.  How  little  he 
shared  that  single-hearted  sincerity,  which  was  the 
secret  of  the  success  of  the  Abolitionists,  is  shown  by 
several  incidents.  In  -  1842  he  complained  to  the 
county  convention  at  Littleton,  of  a  tavern-keeper, 
who  charged  twice  the  usual  sum  for  taking  care  of 
his  horse,  saying  that  "  this  was  cheap  enough  for 
Abolition  beggars."  The  convention  voted  that  the 
publican  was  *'  a  public  imposition  ;  "  and  he  got  a 
verdict  for  a  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  in  damages,  as 
is  related  in  the  "  Liberator  "  for  that  year,  page  72. 
Collins  had  been  a  divinity  student,  and  used  to  open 
meetings  with  prayer;  but,  either  this  or  the  previous 
summer,  he  had  been  invited  to  say  grace  and  had 
turned  over  the  duty  to  Douglass,  who  went  through 
it  with  an  embarrassment  which  was  much  increased 
by  the  pinches  which  were  administered  under  the 
table.  As  soon  as  they  were  alone  together,  the 
"  field-hand  "  remonstrated  with  his  superior,  who 
said,  with  a  laugh,  "  If  your  religion  cannot  stand  a 
pinch,  it  is  not  worth  much."  "  Mr.  Collins,"  was  the 
reply,  "  you  took  me  off  of  the  wharf  in  New  Bedford  ; 


88  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

and   I   had  rather  go  back  there  than  help  a  hypo 
crite." 

Collins  had  suggested  the  hundred  conventions  ; 
but,  according  to  the  report  of  the  State  society  for 
1844,  "  his  ill-health  did  not  permit  him  to  partake  of 
the  labors."  The  fact  is  that  he  was  trying  to  ride  two 
horses,  or,  perhaps,  it  would  be  more  correct  to  say 
that  he  had  been  carried  off  his  feet  by  the  tide  of 
socialism,  which  was  sweeping  over  the  land.  Com 
munities  had  been  founded  in  1842  at  Brook  Farm, 
Hopedale,  and  Northampton  ;  and  the  next  year  pro 
duced  some  fifteen  or  twenty  new  phalanxes  and 
associations,  more  or  less  under  the  influence  of 
Fourierism.  This  doctrine  was  regularly  promul 
gated  in  the  "  New  York  Tribune,"  and  among  its 
adherents  were  Greeley,  Parke  Godwin,  Dana,  Rip- 
ley,  Curtis,  Dwight,  Hawthorne,  Parker,  Margaret 
Fuller,  Lowell,  and  Whittier.  The  general  plan  had 
some  of  the  attractive  features  of  that  recently  made 
familiar  by  Mr.  Bellamy.  All  the  evils  of  poverty, 
over-work,  luxury,  idleness,  and  competition  were  to 
vanish  before  a  system  which  should  make  us  all 
equally  well  off,  and  unite  a  maximum  of  culture  and 
comfort  with  a  minimum  of  constraint.  A  new  com 
munity  of  this  sort  was  the  real  object  for  which 
Collins  was  working  in  1843.  He  came  with  some 
other  Socialists  to  Syracuse,  and  asked  the  Abolition 
ists  to  turn  their  convention  into  a  No  Property 
one.  If  this  little  game  had  succeeded,  it  would  have 
been  kept  up  at  subsequent  meetings.  How  the 
influence  of  the  Garrisonians  would  have  suffered 
from  such  a  close  alliance  with  communism  may  be 
imagined  from  this  fact.  The  basis  on  which 


"  CONFIDENT    AGAINST    THE    WORLD    IN    ARMS."        89 

Collins  founded  his  community,  that  same  month  at 
Skaneateles,  near  Syracuse,  was  a  declaration,  that 
when  married  people  "  have  outlived  their  affections, 
and  cannot  longer  contribute  to  each  other's  happi 
ness,  the  sooner  the  separation  takes  place  the  bet 
ter  ;"  that  "There  is  to  be 'no  individual  property, 
but  all  goods  shall  be  in  common  ;  "  that  "  All  forms 
of  worship  should  cease ;  "  that  "  All  religions  of 
every  age  and  nation  have  their  origin  in  the  same 
great  falsehood,  viz.,  God's  special  providence  ; "  and 
that  "  We  regard  the  Sabbath  as  other  days,  the 
clergy  as  an  imposition,  and  the  Bible  as  no  authority." 
(See  Noyes'  "  History  of  American  Socialism.") 

This  feature  of  the  Skaneateles  scheme  was  not 
known  when  Collins  tried  to  capture  the  Syracuse 
convention  ;  but  the  man  who  had  made  it  a  success, 
instead  of  an  utter  failure,  had  his  heart  full  of  love 
for  the  slave,  and  he  protested  that  the  building  and 
the  money,  which  had  been  given  for  this  cause, 
could  not  honestly  be  used  tor  any  other.  This  argu 
ment  carried  everything  before  it  at  Syracuse  ;  com 
munism  got  no  assistance  from  anti-slavery  conven 
tions  ;  and  Collins  not  only  resigned  his  place  as 
general  agent  of  the  M.  A.  S.  S.,  but  declined  any 
salary  for  1843. 

His  old  associates  say  nothing  of  the  reason  why  he 
left  them,  in  their  report  for  1844,  and  speak  of  him 
much  more  kindly  than  if  he  had  gone  into  the 
Liberty  party.  Douglass  was  promptly  and  sharply 
reprimanded  for  insubordination  by  "  Captain  Chap 
man,"  but  he  is  still  confident  that  he  was  in  the 
right,  and  events  have  justified  him  fully.  Glowing 
reports  of  the  New  Dispensation  were  sent  out  from 


90  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Skaneateles  ;  but  as  soon  as  they  had  gathered  in 
their  first  harvest,  they  began  to  throw  out  hints  that 
they  would  not  be  offended  by  the  gift  of  potatoes, 
or  apples,  or  cabbages.  The  difficulty,  fatal  sooner 
or  later  to  all  such  undertakings,  of  getting  work 
enough  out  of  the  members,  was  aggravated  by  the 
unwillingness  of  Collins,  who  was  still  a  non-resistant, 
to  save  the  community  from  the  burden  of  any  lazy 
vagabond,  who  chose  to  quarter  himself  upon  it. 
Debts  increased  ;  quarrels  arose  ;  the  communists 
separated  before  they  had  been  three  years  together; 
and  Collins  went  back,  as  was  said  of  him,  "  to  God 
and  the  Whig  party."  His  desire  to  go  to  Congress 
made  him  deny  that  he  had  been  an  Abolitionist,  and 
even  say  that  he  did  not  know  men  who  had  received 
him  as  a  guest,  while  he  was  general  agent,  and  who 
sought  to  renew  their  friendship  in  California. 
Abolitionism,  meantime,  has  changed  the  whole 
condition  of  things  in  this  country,  while  socialism 
has  contributed  nothing  of  much  importance  to 
history,  except  the  ruin  of  the  second  French 
republic. 

In  order  not  to  seem  to  treat  superficially  and  flip 
pantly  of  schemes  which  are  still  enthusiastically 
advocated  by  many  of  the  noblest  men  and  women  in 
this  country  as  well  as  in  Europe,  I  venture  to  present 
some  further  considerations,  in  substantial  conformity 
with  the  present  views  of  Mr.  Douglass.  We  all  know 
that  our  existing  system,  of  free  labor  in  keen  compe 
tition,  has  many  lamentable  defects.  The  weak, 
clumsy,  and  ignorant  suffer  pitiably  ;  the  rich  oppress 
the  poor;  competition  produces  fraud;  and  the  wealth 
thus  gained  is  often  wasted  viciously.  But  it  must 


"CONFIDENT    AGAINST    THE    WORLD    IN    ARMS."        91 

not  be  forgotten  that  these  and  similar  evils  are  grow 
ing  less,  although  they  are  too  closely  connected,  I 
fear,  with  the  fundamental  conditions  of  human 
existence  to  disappear  entirely.  Nothing  seems  to 
me  plainer  than  that  this  competitive  system  has 
succeeded  much  better  than  any  other,  not  only  in 
increasing  the  general  wealth,  to  the  benefit  of  even 
the  poorest,  but  in  developing  individual  energy, 
intelligence,  industry,  economy,  foresight,  perse- 
verance/  and  self-control.  These  and  other  good 
qualities  flourish  much  more  bountifully  in  the  man 
who  knows  that  he  must  have  them  in  order  to  be 
respectable  and  prosperous,  than  they  would  if  he 
knew  his  utter  lack  of  these  virtues  would  not  prevent 
his  enjoying  as  much  comfort  as  his  neighbors.  In 
order  to  understand  the  real  value  of  this  system,  we 
must  also  remember  that  there  is  only  one  other 
which  has  ever  proved  capable  of  even  sustaining 
itself  on  any  large  scale,  or  for  any  considerable 
time.  It  is  often  said  that  the  only  successful  com 
munities  have  been  religious  ones  ;  but  even  the 
Puritans  could  not  make  communism  succeed  at 
Plymouth  ;  and  no  amount  of  religion  would  have 
made  Brook  Farm  prosper  permanently.  What  suc 
cess  has  been  attained  by  religious  communities,  like 
the  Shakers,  has  been  owing  to  the  willingness  of 
the  members,  not  only  to  live  very  cheaply,  but  to 
yield  the  most  submissive  obedience  to  superiors  who 
keep  them  at  work.  Comparatively  little  work  has 
ever  been  done,  except  in  free  competition  or  else 
under  compulsion.  No  authority  has  ever  made  men 
work  as  well  as  they  can  do  in  competition,  a  fact 
of  which  Douglass  became  fully  aware,  when  he 


92  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

exchanged  Baltimore  for  New  Bedford  ;  but  ascet 
icism  enables  the  laborers  to  live  so  cheaply  as  to 
make  up  for  the  loss  of  energy  and  ambition.  Thus  the 
ancient  monks  were  able  to  turn  deserts  into  gardens. 
One  secret  of  their  success,  and  that  of  the  Shakers, 
was  that  all  the  members  began  by  obeying  willingly, 
even  gladly  ;  and  most  of  them  continued  perfectly 
docile.  If  all  the  laborers,  however,  in  a  whole 
nation,  were  brought  under  a  system  of  compulsory 
labor,  some  of  them  would  be  sure  to  dislike  it  ;  and 
very  severe  punishments  would  have  to  be  employed. 
This  was  sometimes  necessary  in  the  monasteries  ; 
and  any  general  system  of  compulsory  labor  would 
necessarily  resemble  slavery  in  its  cruelties,  as  well  as 
in  its  privations.  The  only  alternative,  besides  our 
competitive  system,  is  one  which  has  too  much  in 
common  with  negro  slavery.  The  only  system  of 
labor  which  a  lover  of  liberty  can  favor  consistently, 
is  the  one  which  we  have  already  established  among 
us.  We  ought  to  do  all  we  can  to  lessen  its  defects  ; 
but  to  abandon  it  would  be  not  only  "  looking  back 
ward,"  but  going  backward. 

From  Syracuse  the  Garrisonians  came  to  Rochester, 
where  the  Liberty  men  received  them  hospitably. 
Then  Douglass  went  to  Buffalo  with  Bradburn,  who 
refused  to  stop,  because  no  better  place  had  been  en 
gaged  than  a  deserted  room,  without  doors  or  win 
dows,  formerly  used  as  a  post-office,  and  nobody  came 
to  the  convention  except  a  few  hackmen,  of  various 
colors,  who  sat  there,  whip  in  hand.  Such  was  the 
audience  before  which  Bradburn  deserted  his  com 
panion  and  went  off  to  Cleveland.  But  the  spirit  of 
Douglass  rose  to  the  occasion  ;  and  so  did  his  voice. 


"CONFIDENT  AGAINST  THE  WORLD  IN  ARMS.        93 

It  pealed  forth  from  that  old  building,  like  a  trumpet, 
through  the  streets,  and  called  in  the  passers-by. 
Every  meeting  increased  his  audience  ;  ere  long 
he  was  invited  into  a  church  ;  this  soon  became 
too  small  ;  and  he  had  to  speak  in  the  park,  where 
there  were  four  or  five  thousand  hearers.  The 
audience  in  the  old  post-office  was  so  fully  in  keeping 
with  the  place,  that  he  "  was  delighted  to  see  there, 
one  day,  a  young  lady,  who  brought  no  escort  but  a 
little  girl,  and  who  was  so  beautiful  as  to  look,  in  that 
rough  crowd,  like  an  angel  of  light."  He  did  not 
expect  to  see  her  there  again  ;  but  she  came  every 
time.  He  asked  her  name  ;  and  found  she  was  the 
daughter  of  Myron  Holley,  one  of  the  founders  of  the 
Liberty  party.  Her  father  had  been  reduced  to 
earning  his  living  by  carrying  round  milk  ;  but  he 
still  retained  such  dignity,  that  a  little  girl,  who  was 
a  visitor  at  the  house  of  a  Rochester  clergyman,  once 
ran  into  the  parlor  to  say,  "  God  did  bring  in  milk." 
His  daughter  has  done  good  service  as  an  Abolitionist 
lecturer,  and  is  still  working,  as  a  teacher,  among  the 
freedmen.  A  letter  of  recollections,  which  she  has 
kindly  contributed,  opens  thus  : 

"  In  the  early  autumn  of  1843,  at  an  anti-slavery  meeting  in 
Buffalo,  I  first  had  the  happiness  to  hear  Frederick  Douglass 
make  a  speech.  He  was  then  a  young  man,  only  in  the  faint 
dawn  of  his  splendid  day.  It  was  a  poor  little  meeting — the 
odds  and  ends  of  the  city — not  a  soul  there  I  had  ever  seen.  I 
had  never  heard  a  fugitive  slave  speak,  and  was  immensely  in 
terested  to  hear  him.  He  rose,  and  I  soon  perceived  he  was 
all  alive.  His  soul  poured  out  with  rare  pathos  and  power. 
Among  other  things,  he  told  how  a  slave-holder  would  preach 
to  an  audience  of  slaves  and  take  the  text :  '  Servants,  be  obe- 


94.  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

dicnt  to  your  masters,'  and  then  proceed  to  say,  '  The  Lord  in 
His  Providence  sent  pious  souls  over  to  Africa — dark,  heathen, 
benighted  Africa — to  bring  you  into  this  Christian  land,  where 
you  can  sit  beneath  the  droppings  of  the  sanctuary  and  hear 
about  Jesus !  The  Lord  has  so  established  things  that  only 
through  the  channel  of  obedience  can  happiness  flow.  For  in 
stance,  Sam,  the  other  day,  was  sent  out  by  his  master  to  do  a 
piece  of  work  that  would  occupy  about  two  hours  and  a  half. 
At  the  expiration  of  that  time,  Sam's  master  went  out ;  and,  lo  ! 
and  behold  !  there  lay  Sam's  hoe  in  one  place,  and  Sam  in  an 
other,  fast  asleep  !  The  master  remembered  the  words  of 
Scripture :  '  He  that  knoweth  his  master's  will,  and  doeth  it 
not,  shall  be  beaten  with  many  stripes.'  So  Sam  \vas  taken  up 
and  whipped,  so  that  he  was  disabled  from  doing  any  work  for 
the  short  space  of  three  weeks  and  a  half.  '  For  only  through 
the  channel  of  obedience  can  happiness  flow  ! '  " 

Soon  after  the  convention  which  opened  among  the 
hackmen  in  Buffalo,  another  was  held  there  by  the 
colored  people  ;  and  then  Douglass  carried  his  audi 
ence  with  him  in  opposition  to  Dr.  Garnett,  who 
wished  to  have  the  slaves  advised  to  rise  and  slay 
their  masters.  His  pacific  course  did  not  prevent  an 
attempt  to  lynch  him  at  Manayunk,  near  Philadelphia, 
on  his  return  from  a  meeting  of  the  Abolitionists  of 
Pennsylvaniaat  Norristown.  The  danger  was  known 
in  season  ;  and  the  train  dashed  through  without 
stopping,  in  spite  of  an  attempt  to  wreck  it. 

We  next  find  him  in  Ohio  as  one  of  the  speakers 
at  the  mass-meeting,  held  by  the  State  Society  in 
Oakland,  Clinton  County,  where  several  thousand 
Abolitionists  were  gathered  together,  after  having  in 
some  cases  traveled  hundreds  of  miles.  It  may  have 
been  on  this  occasion,  and  it  was  at  all  events  in  this 
State,  that  an  Irishman,  who  was  in  the  audience,  said 


"CONFIDENT  AGAINST  THE  WORLD  IN  ARMS.        95 

to  another,  "  And  what  do  ye  think  of  that  for  a 
naygur?"  "  Be  aisy,"  was  the  answer.  "  He's  only 
half  a  naygur."  "  And  if  a  half  a  naygur  can  spake 
like  that,  what  could  a  whole  one  do?"  His  com 
panions  on  the  platform  found  that  when  he  was 
among  the  first  speakers,  the  interest  ended  too  soon; 
but  when  he  was  not,  it  did  not  begin  until  he  did. 

Before  leaving  Ohio,  they  separated  into  two  par 
ties,  with  different  routes.  He  was  not  in  that  which 
rode  through  Indiana  in  the  "  Liberator  ;"  but  he 
had  the  honor  of  being  hospitably  entertained  by 
Hon.  J.  R.  Giddings,  as  well  as  of  having  other  mem 
bers  of  Congress  take  part  in  greeting  him  at  Rich 
mond,  Indiana,  with  a  shower  of  pro-slavery  eggs. 
At  Pendleton,  in  that  State,  things  looked  so  black 
on  the  first  day,  September  15,  that  they  had  reason 
to  be  glad  of  the  rain,  which  drove  them  away  from 
their  platform  in  the  woods.  That  night,  the  citizens 
adopted  resolutions  insisting  on  the  rights  of  free 
discussion.  Scarcely  had  the  meetings  begun,  how 
ever,  when  a  column  of  rowdies,  armed  with  pistols 
and  clubs,  marched  in,  two  by  two,  one  of  the  leaders 
wearing  a  coon-skin  cap,  to  show  that  he  was  a  Whig; 
while  the  other  was  supposed  to  be  a  Democrat  of  the 
old  school,  from  his  dirty,  ragged  shirt,  and  no  coat. 
One  of  them  asked  the  Abolitionists,  why  they  did 
not  go  South  to  speak  ;  and  they  politely  invited  him 
to  mount  the  platform.  He  made  so  poor  an  appear 
ance  on  it,  however,  that  his  friends  began  to  tear  it 
down.  Others  were  about  to  attack  Douglass  ;  but 
the  lady  who  had  received  him  as  a  guest,  Mrs.  Re 
becca  Fussell,  wife  of  a  physician  in  the  town,  held  up 
her  baby  before  him  ;  and  he  was  left  unharmed  for 


96  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

a  while.  A  little  boy  ran  up,  however,  crying,  "  They 
are  killing  Mr.  White  !  "  Douglass  thought  it  was  a 
friend  who  had  come  with  him  from  the  East.  All 
his  principles  of  non-resistance  vanished.  He  seized 
a  stick,  and  plunged,  as  eager  as  any  knight,  into  the 
fray.  He  soon  found  that  his  friend  was  in  no  danger; 
but  another  Mr.  White  had  been  knocked  down,  and 
had  lost  several  teeth  ;  his  club  was  wrested  from 
him  and  he  had  to  retreat.  He  was  pursued,  and 
struck  down  with  a  blow  that  broke  his  right  hand. 
A  second  blow  was  aimed  at  his  head,  and  might  have 
been  fatal,  if  his  friend,  White,  had  not  saved  him,  at 
the  cost  of  being  knocked  down  himself  and  badly 
wounded  in  the  head.  Douglass  was  able  to  lecture 
next  day,  however  ;  but  he  never  went  back  to  non- 
resistance.  Bradburn's  first  words  to  him  were, 
"Where's  your  consistency?  Why  did  you  fight?" 
"  Where's  yours?"  was  the  answer.  "  Why  didn't  you 
fight?" 

It  was,  I  think,  at  another  place  in  Indiana,  that 
Bradburn  received  warning,  just  as  he  was  about  to 
begin  a  meeting  in  company  with  Douglass,  that  the 
latter  was  going  to  be  taken  out  of  the  hall  to  be 
tarred  and  feathered.  Bradburn  quietly  looked 
about,  and  found,  in  the  rear  of  the  platform  a  little 
door,  opening  on  a  passage  which  led  out  into  a  back 
street.  Scarcely  had  he  made  this  discovery  when 
the  mob  began  to  mount  the  platform  and  order  the 
Abolitionists  to  disperse.  He  whispered  a  word  or 
two  to  Douglass  and  then  went  forward  to  meet  the 
rioters.  "  What  can  I  do  for  you,  gentlemen  ?  "  said 
Bradburn,  with  the  utmost  politeness.  "  We  don't 
want  nothing  of  you,"  was  the  reply.  "  We  want 


"CONFIDENT  AGAINST  THE  WORLD  IN  ARMS."      97 

that  nigger  of  yours."  "  Beg  your  pardon,  gentle 
men,  but  I  am  very  deaf,"  as  was  really  the  case. 
"  Please  speak  a  little  louder."  "  We  want  Fred 
Douglass,"  shouted  the  mob  ;  "  and  we  are  going  to 
have  him.  We  mean  to  take  his  jacket  off."  "  What 
do  you  say,  please,"  said  Bradburn,  with  his  hand  to 
his  ear  ;  and  so  it  went  on,  until  it  was  found  that 
Douglass  had  escaped. 

Another  incident  of  this  campaign  was,  that  White 
and  Douglass  once  happened  to  be  invited  to  pass 
the  night  with  a  farmer,  who  had  only  one  bed-room 
for  all  his  household,  and  only  one  spare  bed.  When 
it  was  time  to  go  to  rest,  there  was  a  good  deal  of 
anxious  whispering,  until  the  dark  guest  said  : 
"  Friend  White,  having  got  entirely  rid  of  my  preju 
dice  against  color,  I  think,  as  a  proof  of  it,  I  must 
allow  you  to  sleep  with  me  to-night." 

The  last  convention  of  1843  was  held  on  December 
4,  in  Philadelphia,  to  commemorate  the  foundation, 
ten  years  before,  of  the  American  Anti-Slavery 
Society,  and  Douglass-  was  among  the  speakers, 
although  he  was  told,  as  he  passed  through  Gettys 
burg,  that  he  was  in  danger  of  being  kidnapped,  and 
had  better  not  go  out  of  doors  except  at  night.  He 
also  held  a  debate  with  Mrs.  Ernestine  L.  Rose,  who 
had  done  good  work  for  abolitionism,  as  well  as  for 
the  enfranchisement  of  her  own  sex.  She  now 
asserted  the  superior  importance  of  socialism,  and 
Douglass  said  nothing  against  it,  but  simply  insisted 
on  the  claims  of  the  slave  to  be  considered  first. 

The  next  year  gave  disunionism  a  complete  vic 
tory,  first  in  January  and  then  in  May,  at  the  three 
annual  conventions  in  Boston  and  New  York. 


98  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  M.  A.  S.  S.,  in  1844, 
Douglass  opposed  a  resolution,  which  was  passed  in 
Faneuil  Hall,  January  24,  declaring  that  the  Ameri 
can  Church  "  Is  not  the  Church  of  Christ,  but  the 
synagogue  of  Satan."  During  subsequent  sessions, 
Ex-president  Adams,  then  almost  eighty,  was  cen 
sured  for  not  doing  more  against  slavery,  which  he 
was  then  resolutely  opposing  to  the  best  of  his  judg 
ment  in  Congress.  The  Liberty  party  was  voted  pro- 
slavery.  Birney,  who  had  been  nominated  for  the 
Presidency  once  more,  in  opposition  to  both  Whigs 
and  Democrats,  was  declared  to  have  "  conspired  to 
betray  the  anti-slavery  cause  into  the  hands  of  its 
most  insidious  foes,"  and  to  be  "a  man  not  deserving 
of  the  approval  or  support  of  any  genuine  Abolition 
ist  ;  "  and  on  January  27  the  publication  was  ordered 
of  a  "  Protest  of  the  Massachusetts  Anti-Slavery 
Society  against  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States 
and  the  Union."  This  was  written  by  Foster,  whose 
influence  was  now  said  to  be  greater  than  even  Gar 
rison's  ;  and  among  the  characteristic  sentences  are 
these  :  "  We  now  publicly  adjure  our  allegiance  :  " 
"  Henceforth  let  Repeal  be  our  watchword." 

The  best  thing  done  at  this  convention  was  to  agree 
to  hold  a  hundred  others,  that  winter  and  spring,  in 
various  towns  of  Massachusetts.  One  of  these  meet 
ings  was  held  at  Townsend,  where  Douglass,  as  he 
says  in  a  letter  written  for  the  "  Liberator,"  on  March 
6,  noticed  in  the  old  church,  then  belonging  to  the 
town,  as  they  came  together,  a  hole  in  the  wall  about 
twelve  feet  long,  beside  the  pulpit.  He  asked  what 
it  was,  and  was  told  that  this  had  formerly  been 
"  the  niggers'  seat,"  but  had  gone  out  of  use.  The 


"  CONFIDENT    AGAINST    THE    WORLD    IN    ARMS."        99 

sexton  showed  him  how  to  climb  up  there  by  a  lad 
der,  but  it  made  him  giddy  to  look  down.  Then  the 
Hutchinsons  took  possession,  and  sang  there  through 
the  meeting. 

At  Sudbury  there  was  a  strong  opposition  from  the 
enemies  of  temperance,  who  had  just  carried  the 
town-meeting,  and  who  are  thus  described  : 

"  Such  a  set  of  rum-faces,  rum-noses,  rum-heads,  I  think  I 
never  saw  congregated  in  town-meeting  anywhere.  It  was 
impossible  to  get  us  a  meeting  in  this  place.  The  clergy  here 
bear  almost  entire  sway.  They  decide  for  the  people  what 
they  shall  hear,  and  what  they  shall  not  hear.  Each  of  the 
ministers  devoted  a  good  part  of  last  Sunday  to  warning  their 
congregations  against  attending  our  meetings.  The  conse 
quence  is  that  a  mob  is  threatened,  if  we  should  attempt  to 
hold  our  meeting  according  to  notice.  We  should  not,  how 
ever,  be  intimidated  by  that,  if  we  could  get  the  people  out. 
But  this  we  cannot  do,  and  must  therefore  pass  this  place  by, 
at  least  for  the  present.  It  was  not  a  little  amusing  to  see  the 
harmony  and  perfect  agreement  of  the  Rabbis  and  rummies  of 
the  place,  in  their  opposition  to  our  meeting." 

In  Grafton  our  hero  was  allowed  to  decide  for  him 
self  whether  there  should  be  a  meeting.  "  I  was 
alone,"  he  says,  "  and  there  was  neither  house,  hall, 
nor  church  in  which  I  could  speak  to  the  people. 
But,  determined  to  speak,  I  went  to  the  hotel  and 
borrowed  a  dinner-bell,  with  which  in  hand  I  passed 
through  the  principal  streets,  ringing  the  bell  and 
crying  out,  '  Notice  !  Frederick  Douglass,  recently 
a  slave,  will  lecture  on  American  slavery,  on  Grafton 
Common,  this  evening  at  seven  o'clock.  This 
brought  out  a  large  audience,  but  after  that  evening 
the  largest  church  in  town  was  open  to  me."  He  had 


100  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

afterward  to  take  the  same  course  at  Manchester, 
New  Hampshire,  and  with  similar  results. 

On  Thursday,  May  10,  at  New  York,  the  A.  A.  S.  S. 
adopted,  by  a  vote  of  three  to  one,  a  resolution 
declaring  that  "  Secession  from  the  present  United 
States  government  is  the  duty  of  every  abolitionist." 
Mr.  White,  who  had  saved  the  life  of  Douglass  in 
Indiana,  protested  in  vain,  as  did  Mr.  Child,  who  then 
gave  up  editing  the  "  National  Anti-Slavery  Stand 
ard,"  on  which  his  gifted  wife,  too,  had  labored.  On 
the  last  day  of  this  month,  the  New  England  conven 
tion,  in  Boston,  voted  to  agitate  for  a  dissolution  of 
the  Union.  In  the  list  of  two  hundred  and  fifty 
names  in  the  affirmative,  that  of  Douglass  stands 
tenth  ;  and  there  were  but  twenty-four  in  the  nega 
tive.  That  Friday  evening  a  disunion  banner  was 
publicly  presented  by  C.  C.  Burleigh,  in  behalf  of  this 
convention  to  Garrison,  as  President  of  the  A.  A.  S.  S. 
On  one  side  was  the  new  motto,  "  No  Union  with 
Slaveholders,"  and  on  the  other  a  slave  lay  prostrate 
and  trampled  down  by  the  American  eagle,  who  was 
wrapped  in  the  national  flag,  on  which  was  the  word 
"  Protection,"  and  had  under  one  wing  the  Capitol 
with  a  slave-sale  in  front,  while  under  the  other  was 
a  church  with  a  negro  under  the  lash.  The  ground 
was  red,  and  highest  of  all  the  emblems  was  the  eye 
of  God.  The  audience  was  so  excited  by  this  scene, 
as  well  as  by  the  attacks  made  on  the  Church,  that 
the  convention  ended  that  night  in  a  row. 

Neither  a  resolution  condemning  the  Church,  nor 
one  repudiating  the  Union,  could  be  parried  by 
Douglass,  Burleigh,  and  Remond,  in  the  meeting, 
held  on  June  12,  in  the  Universalist  church,  now  a 


"CONFIDENT  AGAINST  THE  WORLD  IN  ARMS.''    101 

Catholic  one,  in  Concord.  But  few  of  the  residents 
would  go  to  the  Court  House,  and  the  Unitarians 
would  not  suffer  their  bell  to  be  rung,  except  for  two 
or  three  unauthorized  strokes, when  Emerson  lectured, 
on  August  i,  on  "  The  History  of  Emancipation  in 
the  British  West  Indies."  Little  reference  seems  to 
have  been  made  by  him  to  the  condition  of  the  slaves 
in  the  United  States  ;  but  his  treatment  of  the  sub 
ject  announced  was  so  lofty,  that  when  the  audience, 
mostly  from  abroad,  met  for  a  collation  afterward, 
they  said  to  each  other,  "Can  you  eat?  I  cannot." 
Douglass  was  among  the  listeners  that  morning,  and 
also  among  the  speakers  in  the  afternoon.  The  next 
day  he  took  part  with  Pierpont  and  James  Freeman 
Clark,  in  a  great  mass-meeting,  appointed  for  the 
first,  but  postponed  on  account  of  the  weather,  at 
Hingham,  where  the  disunion  banner  was  carried 
through  gaily  decorated  streets  in  a  long  procession, 
amid  the  ringing  of  the  bells.  He  is  described  by  a 
lady  who  saw  him  this  summer,  and  often  afterwards, 
as  showing  as  much  culture  from  the  very  first  as 
ever  after,  and  as  displaying  in  his  conversation  rare 
integrity  of  character,  as  well  as  great  activity  of 
intellect.  She  also  says  that  he  made  no  gestures, 
unless  excited  ;  and  that  he  was  not  only  very  fond 
of  horses,  but  perfectly  able  to  pick  out  a  good  one. 

That  same  month  Douglass  revisited  Norristown  ; 
and  on  August  17,  he  spoke  on  a  table  in  the  State 
House  yard  in  Philadelphia.  During  the  autumn  we 
hear  of  him  at  various  cities  in  New  Hampshire, 
Maine,  Massachusetts,  and  Rhode  Island.  There  was 
now  great  excitement  on  account  of  the  prospect  that 
Texas  would  soon  be  annexed,  as  actually  happened  in 


102  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

1845  ;  and  Douglass  took  part  with  Phillips,  Garrison, 
and  Remond  in  the  protest  made  by  the  M.  A.  S.  S., 
in  Representatives'  Hall,  on  Friday  evening,  January 
26,  against  throwing  open  this  new  field  to  slavery. 

He  had  abstained,  hitherto,  from  telling  the  public 
where  he  had  been  a  slave,  or  what  was  his  original 
name.  These  precautions  seemed  necessary  for  his 
safety  ;  but  they  were  not  favorable  to  his  reputation 
for  veracity.  People  began  to  think  that  he  had 
never  been  a  slave.  They  said  he  did  not  talk,  or 
look,  or  act  like  one  ;  and  his  failure  to  give  particu 
lars  was  sadly  against  him.  His  education,  too,  was 
not  to  be  reconciled  with  the  ignorance  in  which 
slaves  were  said  to  live.  As  he  walked  down  the 
aisles  of  a  church,  after  a  lecture,  he  used  to  hear 
people  say,  "  He's  never  been  a  slave,  I'll  warrant 
you."  Douglass  has  never  been  so  little  of  a  man  as 
to  stand  any  doubt  of  his  honor.  He  preferred  to  run 
the  risk  of  recapture,  and  tell  all  about  himself  to  the 
world,  except  the  way  he  escaped.  When  he  declared 
his  intention  at  New  Bedford,  there  was  a  general 
murmur  through  the  audience  of  "  He  had  better 
not."  This  Phillips  mentioned  in  a  lecture  that 
March,  and  exclaimed,  "God  dash  the  Common 
wealth  of  Massachusetts  into  a  thousand  pieces,  till 
there  shall  not  remain  a  fragment  on  which  an  honest 
man  can  stand  and  not  dare  to  tell  his  name."  He 

added  that  "  Frederick ,  to  our  disgrace,  we  know 

not  what  to  call  him"  .  .  .  "has  won  a  colorless 
reputation  in  these  parts."  Soon  after  saying  this,  he 
wrote  him  thus,  "  I  shall  read  your  book  with 
trembling  for  you.  Some  years  ago,  when  you  were 
beginning  to  tell  me  your  real  name  and  birthplace,  you 


"CONFIDENT  AGAINST  THE  WORLD  IN  ARMS."    103 

may  remember  I  stopped  you,  and  preferred  to  remain 
ignorant  of  all.  With  the  exception  of  a  vague 
description,  so  I  continued  till  the  other  day,  when 
you  read  me  your  memoirs.  I  hardly  knew  at  the 
time,  whether  to  thank  you  or  not  for  the  sight  of 
them,  when  I  reflected  that  it  was  still  dangerous  in 
Massachusetts  for  honest  men  to  tell  their  names."  . .  . 
"  In  all  the  broad  lands  which  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States  overshadows,  there  is  no  single  spot, 
however  narrow  or  desolate,  where  a  fugitive  slave 
can  plant  himself  and  say,  *  I  am  safe.'  The  whole 
armory  of  Northern  law  has  no  shield  for  you.  I  am 
free  to  say  that,  in  your  place,  I  should  throw  the 
manuscript  into  the  fire." 

This  letter  was  printed,  with  the  "  Narrative  of  the 
Life  of  Frederick  Douglass,  an  American  Slave, 
Written  by  himself  ;  "  in  a  bound  volume  of  a  hun 
dred  and  forty  pages,  which  was  published  at  the 
Anti-Slavery  office  in  Boston,  and  sold  for  fifty  cents. 
The  little  book  also  contains  a  portrait  of  the  author  and 
a  letter  describing  his  first  appearance  at  Nantucket, 
from  Garrison,  who  also  says  that,  "  His  success  in 
combating  prejudice,  in  gaining  proselytes,  in  agitat 
ing  the  public  mind,  has  far  surpassed  the  most  san 
guine  expectations  that  were  raised  at  the  commence 
ment  of  his  brilliant  career."  Scarcely  anything  is 
said  about  this  career  in  the  "  Narrative,"  which,  so 
far  as  it  goes,  is  substantially  the  same  as  the  auto 
biographical  accounts  published  in  1855  and  1882. 
The  earliest  of  the  three  memoirs  was  merely 
expanded  to  form  the  second  ;  and  that  was  con 
tracted  again  to  make  part  of  the  third..  The  prin 
cipal  peculiarities  of  the  "  Narrative  "  are  the  portrait, 


104  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

the  introductory  letters  from  Garrison  and  Phillips, 
and  the  appendix,  containing  not  only  the  parody  of 
the  slave-holders'  hymn,  but  this  explanation  of 
rebukes  often  administered  : 

"  I  find,  since  reading  over  the  foregoing  '  Narrative,'  that  I 
have,  in  several  instances,  spoken  in  such  a  tone  and  manner 
respecting  religion,  as  may  possibly  lead  those  unacquainted 
with  my  religious  views  to  suppose  me  an  opponent  of  all  reli 
gion.  To  remove  the  liability  of  such  misapprehension,  I  deem 
it  proper  to  append  the  following  brief  explanation.  What  I 
have  said  respecting  and  against  religion,  I  mean  strictly  to 
apply  to  the  slave-holding  religion  of  this  land,  and  with  no 
possible  reference  to  Christianity  proper ;  for,  between  the 
Christianity  of  this  land,  and  the  Christianity  of  Christ,  I  recog 
nize  the  widest  possible  difference,  so  wide,  that  to  receive  the  one 
as  good,  pure  and  holy,  is  of  necessity  to  reject  the  other  as  bad, 
corrupt,  and  wicked.  To  be  the  friend  of  the  one  is  of  necessity 
to  be  the  enemy  of  the  other.  I  love  the  pure,  peaceable,  and 
impartial  Christianity  of  Christ;  I  therefore  hate  the  corrupt, 
slave-holding,  woman-whipping,  cradle-plundering,  partial  and 
hypocritical  Christianity  of  this  land.  Indeed,  I  can  see  no 
reason,  but  the  most  deceitful  one,  for  calling  the  religion  of 
this  land  Christianity.  I  look  upon  it  as  the  climax  of  all  mis 
nomers,  the  boldest  of  all  frauds,  and  the  grossest  of  all  libels. 
Never  was  there  a  clearer  case  of  '  stealing  the  livery  of  the 
court  of  Heaven  to  serve  the  devil  in.'  I  am  filled  with  unutter 
able  loathing  when  I  contemplate  the  religious  pomp  and  show, 
together  with  the  horrible  inconsistencies,  which  everywhere 
surround  me.  We  have  men-stealers  for  ministers,  woman- 
whippers  for  missionaries,  and  cradle-plunderers  for  church 
members.  The  man  who  wields  the  blood-clotted  cowskin 
during  the  week,  fills  the  pulpit  on  Sunday,  and  claims  to  be  a 
minister  of  the  meek  and  lowly  Jesus.  He  who  sells  my  sister 
for  purposes  qf  prostitution,  stands  forth  as  the  pious  advocate 
of  purity.  The  man  who  robs  me  of  my  earnings  at  the  end  of 


"CONFIDENT    AGAINST    THE    WORLD    IN    ARMS.         105 

£ach  week,  meets  me  as  a  class-leader  on  Sunday  morning,  to 
show  me  the  way  of  life  and  the  path  of  salvation.  He  who 
proclaims  it  a  religious  duty  to  read  the  Bible,  denies  me  the 
right  of  learning  to  read  the  name  of  the  God  who  made  me.  He 
who  is  the  religious  advocate  of  marriage,  robs  whole  millions 
of  its  sacred  influence,  and  leaves  them  to  the  ravages  of  whole 
sale  pollution.  The  warm  defender  of  the  sacredness  of  the 
family  relation,  is  the  same  that  scatters  whole  families,  sunder 
ing  husbands  and  wives,  parents  and  children,  sisters  and 
brothers,  leaving  the  hut  vacant,  and  the  hearth  desolate.  We 
see  the  thief  preaching  against  theft,  and  the  adulterer  against 
adultery.  We  have  men  sold  to  build  churches,  women  sold  to 
support  the  gospel,  and  babes  sold  to  purchase  Bibles  for  the 
poor  heathen — all  for  the  glory  of  God  and  the  good  of  souls. 
The  slave-auctioneer's  bell  and  the  church-going  bell  chime  in 
with  each  other  ;  and  the  bitter  cries  of  the  heart-broken  slave 
are  drowned  in  the  religious  shouts  of  his  pious  master.  Revi 
vals  of  religion  and  revivals  in  the  slave-trade  go  hand  in  hand 
together.  The  slave-prison  and  the  church  stand  near  each 
other.  The  clanking  of  fetters  and  the  rattling  of  chains  in  the 
prison,  and  the  pious  psalm  and  solemn  prayer  in  the  church 
may  be  heard  at  the  same  time.  The  dealers  in  the  bodies  and 
souls  of  men  erect  their  stand  in  the  presence  of  the  pulpit ;  and 
they  mutually  help  each  other.  The  dealer  gives  his  blood 
stained  gold  to  support  the  pulpit ;  and  the  pulpit  in  return 
covers  his  infernal  business  with  the  garb  of  Christianity.  Here 
we  have  religion  and  robbery  the  allies  of  each  other,  devils 
dressed  in  angels'  robes,  and  hell  presenting  the  semblance  of 
paradise. " 

The  words  of  Jesus  against  the  Pharisees  are  then 
quoted  with  the  comment  : 

"  Dark  and  terrible  as  is  this  picture,  I  hold  it  to  be  strictly 
true  of  the  overwhelming  mass  of  professed  Christians  in 
America.  They  strain  at  a  gnat  and  swallow  a  camel.  Could 
anything  be  more  true  of  our  churches  ?  They  would  be 


106  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

shocked  at  the  proposition  of  fellowshiping  a  sheep-stealer; 
and  at  the  same  time  they  hug  to  their  communion  a  man- 
stealer,  and  brand  me  with  being  an  infidel,  if  I  find  fault  with 
them  for  it."  ..."  They  love  the  heathen  on  the  other  side  of 
the  globe.  They  can  pray  for  him,  pay  money  to  have  the  Bible 
put  into  his  hands,  and  missionaries  to  instruct  him  ;  while  they 
despise  and  totally  neglect  the  heathen  at  their  own  doors.  Such 
is  very  briefly  my  view  of  the  religion  of  this  land  ;  and,  to  avoid 
any  misunderstanding,  growing  out  of  the  use  of  general  terms, 
I  mean  by  the  religion  of  this  land,  that  which  is  revealed  in  the 
words,  deeds,  and  actions  of  those  bodies,  North  and  South, 
calling  themselves  Christian  churches,  and  yet  in  union  with 
slave-holders.  It  is  against  religion,  as  presented  by  these 
bodies,  that  I  have  felt  it  my  duty  to  testify." 

The  same  week  that  this  little  book  was  published, 
we  find  its  author,  on  May  8,  1845,  repeating  the 
Covey  episode  in  full  in  the  Broadway  Tabernacle,  at 
the  convention  of  the  A.  A.  S.  S.,  to  prove  that  slav 
ery  was  necessarily  cruel.  Various  portions  were 
copied  by  friendly  newspapers  with  high  praise.  The 
"Tribune,"  for  instance,  says  that,  "Considered 
merely  as  a  narrative,  we  never  read  one  more  simple, 
true,  coherent  and  warm  with  genuine  feeling.  It  is 
an  excellent  piece  of  writing,  and  on  that  score  to  be 
prized  as  a  specimen  of  the  powers  of  the  black  race." 
The  "  Liberator  "  says,  on  May  28,  two  weeks  after 
announcing  the  publication,  that  "The  edition  is  pas 
sing  off  rapidly."  The  demand  was  so  brisk  that  the 
author  had  to  carry  copies  into  the  churches,  where 
he  lectured,  and  go  with  them  through  the  aisles. 
Four  more  editions  were  called  for  within  twelve 
months,  besides  two  at  Dublin  and  another  at  Leeds 
of  five  thousand  copies.  There  is  also,  I  think,  a 
German  or  Dutch  translation,  and  certainly  a  French 


"  CONFIDENT    AGAINST    THE    WORLD    IN    ARMS.         107 

one,  made  by  Miss  Pafkes,  who  contributed  an  excel 
lent  preface,  but  left  out  the  introductory  letters  and 
part  of  the  appendix.  This  last  version,  which  is  a 
reasonably  faithful  one,  except  that  the  proper  names 
are  sometimes  misspelled,  was  published  by  Pagnerre, 
Paris,  in  1848. 

At  the  N.  E.  Convention  in  Boston,  May  27,  1845,  a 
resolution  was  proposed  by  Wendell  Phillips,  and 
passed  as  follows  : 

"  Resolved,  That  we  joyfully  welcome  to  our  ranks  the  new 
anti-slavery  lecturer,  the  '  Narrative  of  the  Life  of  Frederick 
Douglass,  Written  hy  himself ;'  that  we  commend  it  with  con 
fidence  to  all  who  believe  the  slaves  of  the  South  to  be  either 
well  treated,  or  happy,  or  ignorant  of  their  right  to  freedom,  or 
in  need  of  preparation  to  make  them  fit  for  freedom  ;  and  that 
we  urge  upon  the  friends  of  the  cause  the  duty  of  circulating  it 
among  all  classes." 

At  a  subsequent  session,  presided  over  by  Remond, 
Robert  Owen,  the  great  philanthropist,  who  had  been 
advocating  for  nearly  thirty  years  a  socialistic  scheme, 
whose  basis  much  resembled  that  adopted  at  Skane- 
ateles,  tried  to  prove  that  there  was  worse  slavery  in 
England  than  at  the  South.  But  the  members  of  the 
convention  were  perfectly  aware  that,  as  Douglass 
had  said  in  one  of  the  sessions,  twelve  months  before, 
"The  hungry  Englishman  is  a  freeman;  while  the 
slave  is  not  only  hungry  but  a  slave.  The  difference 
is  said  to  be,  that  the  Briton  says  to  his  victim,  *  Work 
for  me,  or  you  shall  starve,'  while  the  American  says 
to  the  slave,  *  Work,  or  you  shall  be  whipped.'  But 
I  know  something  of  this  matter  at  home  ;  and  I  have 


108  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

found  that  we  say,  '  Whip '  and  *  Starve  '  too."  He 
did  not,  however,  strike  another  such  blow  this  year, 
when  the  good  old  man  was  within  his  sword's 
length,  but  reserved  his  full  strength  for  Bradburn. 
The  latter  had  gone  over  to  the  Liberty  party  and 
now  spoke  with  great  ability  and  bifterness  against 
his  former  associates,  protesting  against  any  money 
being  given  to  people  who  were  so  violent  and 
abusive.  Then  Douglass  carried  the  war  into  Africa, 
by  saying  to  Bradburn,  "  I  heard  you  myself,  not  two 
years  ago,  at  Pittsburgh,  denounce  the  very  party 
which  you  have  since  joined,  as  a  set  of  unprincipled 
scoundrels.  I  heard  you."  "  So  did  I  !  "  "  And  I  !  " 
shouted  others.  A  spectator  describes  the  scene  as 
one  of  the  most  exciting  he  ever  witnessed.  Another 
account  says,  "  There  was  the  high-born  and  high- 
minded  representative  of  the  African  race,  into  whose 
hands  (if  he  is  the  man  I  think  and  trust  he  is)  God 
seems  to  have  given  a  mission  as  lofty  and  inspiring 
as  that  entrusted  to  any  one  man  of  our  generation, 
Frederick  Douglass,  to  whom  I  look  more  than  to 
any  other,  as  the  herald  of  his  people's  redemption." 
This  was  written  by  a  clergyman,  who  thought  that 
his  cloth  was  too  roughly  handled.  Pillsbury  and 
Phillips  finally  charged  Christianity  with  being  less 
humane  to  the  slave  than  Moslemism  ;  and  the  con 
vention  broke  up  in  a  disgraceful  row. 

This  I  mention  partly  because  Rogers  had  now  car 
ried  the  No  Government  doctrine  so  far  as  to  hate 
every  kind  of  organization.  He  blamed  the  Abolition 
ists  for  not  letting  poor  crazy  Mrs.  Folsom  say  all  she 
chose  ;  and  he  now  seemed  glad  of  the  mob,  and  said, 
in  the  "  Herald  of  Freedom,"  "  In  such  a  contest 


"CONFIDENT    AGAINST    THE    WORLD    IN    ARMS."      109 

between  Platform  and  People,  I  am  glad  to  see  Plat 
form  defeated."  His  head  seems  to  have  been  much 
less  clear  than  when  he  wrote  the  descriptions  of 
Douglass  already  quoted,  and  corrected  the  saying  of 
Garrison,  that  slavery  was  a  sin  because  the  slave 
was  the  image  of  God.  "  Nay,"  said  Rogers, 
"  Slavery  is  sin,  because  the  slave  is  the  reality  of 
Man."  His  paper  had  come,  early  in  1841,  under  the 
control,  so  far  as  receipts  and  expenses  were  con 
cerned,  of  the  New  Hampshire  Anti-Slavery  Society  ; 
and  he  had  himself  announced  in  an  editorial,  calling 
for  continued  support,  that  "  Every  subscription  aids 
the  society."  In  1844  the  "  Herald  "  collapsed,  and 
he  tried  to  revive  it  in  complete  independence  of  the 
N.  H.  A.  S.  S.  Some  of  the  members  objected, 
others  stood  by  him,  and  the  dispute  was  referred  to 
a  committee,  which  included  Garrison,  Phillips,  and 
others  of  his  best  friends,  and  which  decided  unani 
mously  against  him.  He  refused  to  submit,  and  there 
was  a  sad  quarrel  early  in  June,  1845,  at  the  meeting 
of  the  N.  H.  A.  S.  S.  in  Concord.  Phillips  spoke  for  the 
Society  so  strongly  that  there  was  no  reply,  and  Gar 
rison  charged  Rogers  with  dishonesty.  His  partisans 
became  too  excited  to  listen  for  more  than  a  moment 
to  any  criticism  ;  and  Douglass,  who  admitted  the 
innocence  of  his  motives,  insisted  so  earnestly  on 
being  allowed  to  blame  his  course,  that  Rogers 
charged  him  with  falling  into  "  the  vein  of  a  planta 
tion  slave,  with  the  overseer's  whip  put  into  his  hand." 
He  also  said,  "  I  deny  here  that  Douglass,  or  anybody 
else,  has  the  right  of  speech-making,"  or  delivering  "  a 
long,  uninterrupted,  and  uninterruptible  harangue." 
That  July  Douglass  made  another  trip  to  Western 


110  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

New  York.     The  Liberty  party  organ  in  Utica  speaks 
thus  of  his  visit  : 

"  This  fugitive  from  oppression  lectured  in  this  city  last 
Tuesday  evening.  There  are  not  Garrisonian  Abolitionists 
enough  in  this  city  to  get  him  up  a  meeting,  and  he  was 
indebted  to  ourself  for  the  one  he  held.  Pity  that  so  noble  a 
specimen  of  a  man  should  have  been  spoiled  by  the  miserable 
fallacies  of  the  Garrisonian  philosophy.  We  knew  Frederick 
held  those  peculiarities,  but  we  hoped  he  was  not  so  set  upon 
the  project  of  abolishing  the  Liberty  party  and  the  Union,  as  to 
make  these  objects  the  prime  end  of  his  mission.  In  this, 
however,  we  were  mistaken.  He  labored  an  hour  and  a  half  to 
bring  contempt  upon  the  position,  the  consistency,  and  the 
morality  of  the  very  persons  by  whose  courtesy  he  had  obtained 
a  hearing  in  this  city.  We  regret  this  exceedingly." 

Another  incident  of  this  journey  is  that,  while  he 
was  going  on  a  canal-boat  from  Palmyra  to  Rochester, 
he  was  told  that  he  must  not  sit  down  to  breakfast 
with  the  other  passengers,  but  might  with  the 
"  hands."  "  No,"  said  he,  "They  have  just  as  much 
right  as  your  passengers  to  be  free  from  the  disgrace 
of  my  company."  His  color  had  often  shut  him  out, 
even  in  December,  from  the  cabin  of  the  steamboat. 
On  one  such  occasion  Phillips  refused  to  leave  him, 
but  passed  the  night  with  him  on  deck.  Another 
time  one  of  the  officers  took  pity  on  him,  and  asked 
him  if  he  were  not  an  Indian.  The  Douglass  would 
not  stretch  the  truth  to  get  into  comfortable  quarters, 
but  answered,  "  No.  Only  a  d d  nigger." 

We  have  seen  him  fighting  against  brakemen  in 
Massachusetts  and  armed  rioters  in  Indiana,  arguing 
against  Socialists,  Anarchists,  and  Liberty  party  men, 
addressing  sometimes  half-a-dozen  hackmen,  and 


"CONFIDENT    AGAINST    THE    WORLD    IN    ARMS."      Ill 

sometimes,  as  at  Hingham,  six  or  eight  thousand 
intelligent  sympathizers.  For  seven  years  he  had 
been  in  constant  danger  of  arrest,  and  the  peril  was 
very  serious  after  he  chose  to  publish  the  name  and 
address  of  his  master.  We  shall  next  meet  him  in 
safer  and  smoother  paths.  This  change  of  scene  will 
fortunately  make  it  unnecessary  to  dwell  on  the 
errors  of  the  men  and  women  whose  services  to  our 
nation  are  really  beyond  all  praise,  but  whose  mis 
takes  must  be  kept  in  mind,  to  understand  why  our 
black  knight  was  finally  obliged  to  ride  against  them 
also,  with  lance  in  rest. 


CHAPTER  V. 

BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE. 

THE  Fugitive  Slave  Law  was  not  so  severe  in  1845, 
as  it  became  five  years  later  ;  and  recent  legislation 
forbade  State  officials  in  Massachusetts  to  assist  a  kid 
napper.  He  could,  however,  easily  get  support  enough 
from  the  national  courts,  and  also  from  public  senti 
ment,  to  secure  his  prey  ;  and  the  publication  of  the 
"  Narrative  "  made  it  very  rash  for  its  author  to  remain 
even  for  three  months,  as  he  actually  did,  in  the 
United  States.  Great  Britain  offered  perfect  security, 
and  also  new  opportunities  of  education,  as  well  as 
the  possibility  of  obtaining  liberal  aid.  For  these 
reasons  he  took  the  Cunard  steamer  "  Cambria,"  for 
Liverpool,  on  Saturday,  August  16,  1845,  in  company 
with  one  of  his  best  friends  at  Lynn,  where  he  still 
resided,  James  N.  Buffum.  His  color  shut  him  out 
from  the  first  cabin  ;  but  his  book  was  eagerly  read 
there.  Mr.  Buffum,  the  Hutchinsons,  and  other  pas 
sengers  visited  him  often  and  invited  him  not  only  to 
their  cabin,  but  to  the  saloon-deck.  All  parts  of  the 
steamer  soon  became  almost  equally  free  to  him. 
But,  "  I  preferred  to  live  within  my  privileges  and 
keep  upon  my  own  premises.  I  found  this  quite  as 
much  in  accordance  with  good  policy  as  with  my  own 
feelings.  The  effect  was,  that,  with  the  majority  of 
112 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  113 

the  passengers,  all  color  distinctions  were  flung  to  the 
winds  ;  and  I  found  myself  treated  with  every  mark 
of  respect."  ("  Bondage  and  Freedom,"  p.  367.) 

There  were,  however,  so  many  Southerners  on 
board,  as  to  produce  a  curious  mixture  of  "  anti-slavery 
singing  and  pro-slavery  grumbling."  The  system  was 
subjected  to  continual  discussion,  so  that,  as  he  wrote 
to  the  "  Liberator,"  from  Dublin,  on  September  i: 

"  If  suppressed  in  the  saloon,  it  broke  out  in  the  steerage  ; 
and  if  it  ceased  in  the  steerage,  it  was  renewed  in  the  saloon  ; 
and  if  surpressed  in  both,  it  broke  out  with  redoubled  energy 
high  up  on  the  saloon-deck,  in  the  free  ocean  air.  I  was  happy. 
Everything  went  on  nobly.  At  last,  the  evening  previous  to 
our  arrival  in  Liverpool,  the  slave-holders,  convinced  that  reason, 
morality,  common  humanity,  and  Christianity  were  all  against 
them,  abandoned  their  post  in  debate,  and  resorted  to  their  old 
and  natural  mode  of  defending  their  morality  by  brute  force." 
..."  Things  went  on  as  usual,  till  between  five  and  six  o'clock 
in  the  afternoon  of  Wednesday,  when  I  received  an  invitation 
from  the  captain  to  deliver  an  address  upon  the  saloon-deck.  I 
signified  my  willingness  to  do  so  ;  and  he  at  once  ordered  the 
bell  to  be  rung  and  the  meeting  cried.  This  was  the  signal  for 
a  general  excitement.  Some  swore  I  should  not  speak ;  and 
others  said  I  should.  Bloody  threats  were  made  against  me,  if 
I  attempted  it.  At  the  hour  appointed  I  went  upon  the  deck, 
where  I  was  expected  to  speak.  There  was  much  noise  going 
on  among  the  passengers,  evidently  intended  to  make  it  impos 
sible  for  me  to  proceed.  At  length,  our  Hutchinson  friends 
broke  forth  in  one  of  their  unrivalled  songs,  which,  like  the 
angel  of  old,  closed  the  lions'  mouths,  so  that,  for  a  time,  silence 
prevailed.  The  captain  now  introduced  me  ;  and  after  express 
ing  my  gratitude  to  a  kind  Providence  that  had  brought  us 
safely  across  the  sea,  I  proceeded  to  portray  the  condition  of 
my  brethren  in  bonds.  I  had  not  uttered  five  words,  when  a 
Mr.  H.,  from  Connecticut,  called  out  in  a  loud  voice,  '  That's  a 


114  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

lie ! '  I  went  on,  taking  no  notice  of  him,  though  he  was 
murmuring  nearly  all  the  while,  backed  up  by  a  man  from  New 
Jersey.  I  continued,  till  I  said  something  which  seemed  to  cut 
to  the  quick ;  when  out  bawled  H.,  '  That's  a  lie  ! '  and  seemed 
anxious  to  strike  me.  I  then  said  to  the  audience,  that  I  would 
explain  the  reason  of  his  conduct.  The  colored  man  in  our 
country  was  treated  as  a  being  without  rights.  '  That's  a  lie  ! ' 
said  H.  I  then  told  the  audience,  that  as  almost  everything  I 
said  was  pronounced  lies,  I  would  endeavor  to  substantiate 
them  by  reading  a  few  extracts  from  slave-laws.  The  slavo- 
crats,  finding  that  they  were  now  to  be  fully  exposed,  rushed  up 
about  me,  with  hands  clenched,  and  swore  I  should  not  speak. 
They  were  ashamed  to  have  American  laws  read  before  an 
English  audience.  The  captain  said  he  had  tried  to  please  all 
his  passengers ;  a  part  of  them  had  expressed  a  desire  to  hear 
me  lecture  ;  and  those  who  did  not  wish  to  hear  me  might  go 
to  some  other  part  of  the  ship.  He  then  returned  and  requested 
me  to  proceed."  [Another  account  is  that  he  said,  "  Give  it  to 
them,  Douglass,  like  bricks  !  "]  "  I  again  commenced,  but  was 
again  interrupted,  more  violently  than  before.  One  slave-holder 
shook  his  fist  in  my  face  and  said,  '  Oh,  I  wish  I  had  you  in 
Cuba.'  '  Ah,'  said  another,  '  I  wish  I  had  him  in  Savannah. 
We  would  use  him  up.'  Said  another,  '  I  will  be  one  of  a  party 
to  throw  him  overboard.'  A  noble-spirited,  Irish  gentleman 
assured  the  man,  that  two  could  play  at  that  game  ;  and,  in  the 
end,  he  might  be  thrown  overboard  himself.  The  clamor  went 
on,  waxing  hotter  and  hotter,  till  it  was  quite  impossible  for  me 
to  proceed.  I  was  stopped  ;  but  the  cause  went  on.  The  clamor 
was  only  silenced  by  the  captain,  who  told  the  mobocrats  that 
he  would  have  them  put  in  irons  ;  and  he  actually  sent  for  them, 
and  doubtless  would  have  made  use  of  them." 

Nothing  shows  more  clearly  the  inability  of  the 
friends  of  slavery  even  to  listen  to  facts,  than  this 
curious  incident,  the  original  account  of  which  has 
been  copied  with  scarcely  any  omissions. 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  115 

The  next  morning,  Thursday,  August  28,  1845,  they 
landed  at  Liverpool,  and  the  pro-slavery  champions 
soon  had  their  visit  to  Eaton  Hall  spoiled;  for  the 
hated  negro  was  actually  admitted  at  the  same  time 
with  them,  and  treated  equally  well.  They  said  all 
they  could  about  him  in  the  newspapers,  and  thus 
greatly  increased  his  popularity. 

Three  days  after  disembarking  we  find  him  in  Ire 
land.  The  potato-rot,  which  was  to  destroy,  but  lit 
tle  more  than  a  year  later,  a  quarter  of  a  million 
lives,  and  make  three  million  paupers,  had  already 
shown  itself,  and  the  condition  of  the  people  had 
long  been  pitiable.  Popular  education,  poor-laws, 
and  other  practical  remedies  had  been  introduced  by 
the  government,  but  public  attention  was  absorbed 
by  a  wild  agitation  for  repealing  the  Union  with  the 
country  which  was  soon  to  feed  the  whole  island. 
O'Connell's  imprisonment  for  sedition  kept  alive  his 
popularity  until  the  end  of  1845,  when  it  was  dis 
covered,  not  only  that  his  schemes  were  hopelessly 
visionary,  but  that  he  had  long  been  one  of  the  most 
iniquitous  landlords  in  Ireland.  There  was  a  carica 
ture  of  him  in  "  Punch,"  as  the  real  potato-blight. 
Douglass  was  just  in  time  to  get  the  full  benefit  of 
the  cordial  relations  between  Irish  and  American  dis- 
unionists.  The  "  Liberator,"  as  O'Connell  was  called, 
had  denounced  slavery  nobly.  Garrison  had  been 
among  his  open  admirers,  and  vast  sums  had  come 
over  from  the  United  States.  No  wonder  that  "  the 
black  O'Connell,"  as  he  was  soon  named,  was  able  to 
write  to  Boston,  from  Dublin,  on  September  16: 

"  Our  success  here  is  even  greater  than  I  had  anticipated. 
We  have  held  four  glorious  anti-slavery  meetings,  two  in  the 


Il6  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Royal  Exchange,  and  two  in  the  Friends'  meeting-house,  all 
crowded  to  overflowing.  I  am  to  lecture  to-morrow  evening 
in  the  Music  Hall.  It  will  hold  three  thousand  persons,  and  is 
let  for  about  fifty  dollars  a  night.  But  its  generons  proprietor 
has  kindly  agreed  to  let  me  have  it  free  of  charge.  I  have 
attended  several  temperance  meetings,  and  given  several  tem 
perance  addresses.  One  of  the  most  pleasing  features  of  my 
visit,  thus  far,  has  been  a  total  absence  of  all  prejudice  against 
me,  on  account  of  my  color.  I  find  myself  not  treated  as  a 
color,  but  as  a  man ;  not  as  a  thing,  but  as  a  child  of  the  com 
mon  Father  of  us  all."' 

Thirteen  days  later  he  writes  that  he  has  heard 
O'Connell  condemn  slavery  at  a  great  Repeal  meet 
ing  in  Dublin,  has  been  introduced  to  him  on  the 
platform,  and  has  then  said  to  the  multitude,  "  I 
have  stopped  in  this  country  for  a  month  to  see  the 
*  Liberator,'  and  when  I  heard  of  his  approach  in  the 
streets  to-day,  I  rushed  forward  to  catch  a  sight  of 
him  who  had  befriended  the  poor  negro." 

Next  he  went  to  Cork,  where  a  public  breakfast 
was  given  him,  and  the  Mayor  took  the  chair  the  first 
evening  he  spoke.  Would  the  Mayor  of  any  city  in 
the  United  States,  in  1845,  have  gone  into  an  Aboli 
tionist  meeting,  unless  he  wanted  to  have  it  dis 
persed  ?  A  soiree  was  given  by  Father  Mathew,  on 
October  21,  to  Douglass  and  Buffum  ;  and  the  dark 
guest  writes  that  he  was  "  so  entirely  charmed  by  the 
goodness  of  this  truly  good  man,  that  I  besought  him 
to  administer  the  pledge  fo  me.  He  complied  with 
promptness,  and  gave  me  a  beautiful  silver  pledge. 
I  now  reckon  myself  with  delight  the  fifth  of  the  last 
five  of  Father  Mathew's  5,487,495  temperance  chil 
dren."  He  was  invited  soon  after  to  a  reception  in 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  117 

St.  Patrick's  Temperance  Hall,  where  a  song  of  wel 
come,  especially  composed  for  the  occasion,  was  sung, 
and  all  the  company  joined  in  the  chorus.  In  his 
speech  that  night,  he  uttered  this  great  truth  :  "  All 
true  reforms  are  kindred."  He  went  on  to  say  of 
those  who  spoke  of  the  Irish  as  slaves,  a  word  still 
grossly  misapplied  by  agitators,  that 

"  They  do  not  sufficiently  distinguish  between  certain  forms 
of  oppression  and  slavery.  Slavery  is  not  what  takes  away  any 
one  right  or  property  in  man  ;  it  takes  away  man  himself,  and 
makes  him  the  property  of  his  fellow.  It  is  what  unmans  man, 
takes  him  from  himself,  dooms  him  as  a  degraded  thing,  ranks 
him  with  the  bridled  horse  and  muzzled  ox,  makes  him  a 
chattel  personal,  a  marketable  commodity,  to  be  swayed  by  the 
caprice  and  sold  at  the  will  of  his  master." 

So  important  is  this  distinction  that  I  will  here 
quote  from  a  speech  of  his,  made  at  Rochester,  New 
York,  December  i,  1850,  as  follows  : 

"  It  is  often  said  by  the  opponents  of  the  anti-slavery  cause, 
that  the  condition  of  the  people  of  Ireland  is  more  deplorable 
than  that  of  the  American  slaves.  Far  be  it  from  me  to  under 
rate  the  suffering  of  the  Irish  people.  They  have  long  been 
oppressed  ;  and  the  same  heart  that  prompts  me  to  plead  the 
cause  of  the  American  bondmen,  makes  it  impossible  for  me  not 
to  sympathize  with  the  oppressed  of  all  lands.  Yet,  I  must  say, 
that  there  is  no  analogy  between  the  two  cases.  The  Irishman 
is  poor,  but  he  is  not  a  slave.  He  may  be  in  rags,  but  he  is  not  a 
slave.  He  is  still  the  master  of  his  own  body,  and  can  say  with 
the  poet : 

"  The  hand  of  Douglas  is  his  own. 

"  The  world  is  all  before  him,  where  to  choose  ;  " 
"  and  poor  as  may  be  my  opinion  of  the  British  Parliament,  I 
cannot  believe  that  it  will  ever  sink  to  such  a  depth  of  infamy  as 


Il8  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

to  pass  a  law  for  the  re-capture  of  fugitive  Irishmen !  The 
shame  and  scandal  of  kidnapping  will  long  remain  wholly 
monopolized  by  the  American  Congress.  The  Irishman  has  not 
only  the  liberty  to  emigrate  from  his  country,  but  he  has 
liberty  at  home.  He  can  write,  and  speak,  and  co-operate  for 
the  attainment  of  his  rights  and  the  redress  of  his  wrongs.  The 
multitude  can  assemble  upon  all  the  green  hills  and  fertile  plains 
of  the  Emerald  Isle  ;  they  can  pour  out  their  grievances,  and  pro 
claim  their  wants  without  molestation  ;  and  the  press,  that 
'  swift -winged  messenger,'  can  bear  the  tidings  of  their  doings 
to  the  extreme  bounds  of  the  civilized  world.  They  have  their 
'  Conciliation  Hall,'  on  the  banks  of  the  Liffy,  their  reform  clubs 
and  their  newspapers ;  they  pass  resolutions,  send  forth 
addresses,  and  enjoy  the  right  of  petition.  But  how  is  it  with 
the  American  slave  ?  Where  may  he  assemble  ?  Where  is  his 
Conciliation  Hall  ?  W7here  are  his  newspapers  ?  Where  is  his 
right  of  petition  ?  Where  is  his  freedom  of  speech  ?  His  lib 
erty  of  the  press  ?  And  his  right  of  locomotion  ?  He  is  said  to 
be  happy  ;  happy  men  can  speak.  But  ask  the  slave  what  is  his 
condition — what  his  state  of  mind — what  he  thinks  of  enslave 
ment  ?  and  you  had  as  well  address  your  inquiries  to  the  silent 
dead.  There  comes  no  voice  from  the  enslaved.  We  are  left 
to  gather  his  feelings  by  imagining  what  ours  would  be,  were 
our  souls  in  his  soul's  stead.  If  there  were  no  other  fact  descrip 
tive  of  slavery,  than  that  the  slave  is  dumb,  this  alone  would  be 
sufficient  to  mark  the  slave  system  as  a  grand  aggregation  of 
human  horrors." 

After  a  very  successful  tour  through  southern  Ire 
land,  Douglass  went  to  Belfast,  where,  on  January 
6,  1846,  a  public  breakfast  was  given  to  him,  with  a 
member  of  Parliament  in  the  chair.  On  this  occasion 
he  was  presented,  in  behalf  of  the  local  branch  of  the 
British  and  Foreign  Anti-Slavery  Society,  with  a 
Bible,  "splendidly  bound  in  gold."  In  receiving  it, 
he  said  :  "  I  accept  thankfully  this  Bible  ;  and  while 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  119 

it  shall  have  the  best  place  in  my  house,  I  trust  also 
to  give  its  precepts  a  place  in  my  heart."  After  refer- 
ing  to  his  having  been  led,  by  hearing  the  first  chap 
ter  of  Job,  to  wish  to  know  how  to  read,  he  said  : 

"  Twenty  years  ago  while  lying,  not  unlike  a  dog,  at  the  feet  of 
my  mistress,  I  was  roused  from  the  sweet  sleep  of  childhood,  to 
hear  the  narrative  of  Job.  A  few  years  afterward  found  me 
searching  for  the  Scriptures  in  the  muddy  street  gutters,  and 
rescuing  its  pages  from  the  filth."  ..."  A  few  years  later  I 
escaped  from  my  chains,  gained  partial  freedom,  and  became  an 
advocate  for  the  emancipation  of  my  race.  During  this  advo 
cacy,  a  suspicion  obtains  that  I  am  not  what  I  profess  to  be,  to 
silence  which  it  is  necessary  to  write  out  my  experience  in 
slavery,  and  give  the  names  of  my  enslavers.  This  endangers 
my  liberty.  Persecuted,  hunted,  outraged,  in  America,  I  have 
come  to  England,  and  behold  the  change  !  The  chattel  becomes 
a  man.  I  breathe,  and  I  am  free.  Instead  of  culling  the  Scrip 
tures  from  the  mud,  they  come  to  me  dressed  in  polished  gold, 
as  the  free  and  unsolicited  gift  of  devoted  hearts." 

A  few  days  before  he  wrote  thus  to  the  "  Lib 
erator  :  " 

"  I  can  truly  say  I  have  spent  some  of  the  happiest  months 
of  my  life  since  landing  in  this  country.  I  seem  to  have  under 
gone  a  transformation.  I  live  a  new  life.  The  warm  and 
generous  cooperation  extended  to  me  by  the  friends  of  my 
despised  race ;  the  prompt  and  liberal  manner  with  which  the 
press  has  rendered  me  its  aid  ;  the  glorious  enthusiasm  with 
which  thousands  have  flocked  to  hear  the  cruel  wrongs  of  my 
down-trodden  and  long-enslaved  fellow-countrymen  portrayed  ; 
the  deep  sympathy  for  the  slave,  and  the  strong  abhorrence  of 
the  slave-holder,  everywhere  evinced  ;  the  cordiality  with  which 
members  and  ministers  of  various  religious  bodies,  and  of 
various  shades  of  religious  opinion,  have  embraced  me  and 
lent  me  their  aid ;  the  kind  hospitality  constantly  proffered  to 


120  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

me  by  persons  in  the  highest  rank  in  society  ;  the  spirit  of  free 
dom  that  seems  to  animate  all  with  whom  I  come  in  contact, 
and  the  entire  absence  of  anything  that  looked  like  prejudice 
against  me,  on  account  of  the  color  of  my  skin,  contrasted  so 
strongly  with  my  long  and  bitter  experience  in  the  United 
States,  that  I  look  with  wonder  and  amazement  on  the  transi 
tion.  In  the  southern  part  of  the  United  States  I  was  a  slave, 
thought  of  and  spoken  of  as  property  ;  in  the  Northern  States  a 
fugitive  slave,  liable  to  be  hunted  at  any  moment,  like  a  felon, 
and  to  be  hurled  into  the  terrible  jaws  of  slavery — doomed  by 
an  inveterate  prejudice  against  color  to  insult  and  outrage  on 
every  hand  (Massachusetts  out  of  the  question) — denied  the 
privileges  and  courtesies  common  to  others  in  the  use  of  the 
most  humble  means  of  conveyance — shut  out  from  the  cabins 
on  steamboats — refused  admission  to  respectable  hotels — cari 
catured,  scorned,  scoffed,  mocked,  and  maltreated  with 
impunity  by  any  one  (no  matter  how  black  his  heart),  so  he 
has  a  white  skin.  But  now  behold  the  change  !  Eleven  days 
and  a  half  gone,  and  I  have  crossed  three  thousand  miles  of 
the  perilous  deep.  Instead  of  a  democratic  government,  I  am 
under  a  monarchical  government.  Instead  of  the  bright,  blue 
sky  of  America,  I  am  covered  with  the  soft,  grey  fog  of  the 
Emerald  Isle.  I  breathe  ;  and  lo  !  the  chattel  becomes  a  man. 
I  gaze  around  in  vain  for  one  who  will  question  my  equal 
humanity,  claim  me  as  his  slave,  or  offer  me  an  insult.  I 
employ  a  cab — I  am  seated  beside  white  people — I  reach  the 
hotel — I  enter  the  same  door — I  am  shown  into  the  same  par 
lor — I  dine  at  the  same  table — and  no  one  is  offended.  No 
delicate  nose  grows  deformed  in  my  presence.  I  find  no  diffi 
culty  here  in  obtaining  admission  into  any  place  of  worship, 
instruction,  or  amusement,  on  equal  terms  with  people  as  white 
as  any  I  ever  saw  in  the  United  States.  I  meet  nothing  to 
remind  me  of  my  complexion.  I  find  myself  regarded  and 
treated  at  every  turn  with  the  kindness  and  deference  paid  to 
white  people." 

So  pleasant,  in  fact,  was  this  part  of  Mr.  Douglass' 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  121 

life  that  he  recently  selected  it  as  the  subject  of  his 
address,  on  being  invited  to  speak  to  a  literary  club 
in  Washington. 

On  January  10,  1846,  the  two  travelers  left  Ireland, 
where  Douglass  had  given  "  upward  of  fifty  lectures 
in  four  months  ;  "  and  an  even  more  promising  field 
of  labor  was  entered  at  once  in  Scotland.  The  Free 
Church  had  been  created  by  the  heroism  of  the  four 
hundred  Presbyterian  clergymen,  who  resigned,  on 
May  23,  1843,  their  pulpits  and  salaries,  a  loss  of  a 
hundred  thousand  pounds  a  year,  rather  than  sup 
port  any  longer  a  system  by  which  pastors  were 
appointed  by  wealthy  laymen,  without  the  consent  of 
the  parishioners.  The  way  in  which  this  body  was 
formed  gave  high  authority  to  all  its  utterances,  and 
it  was  shocking  to  see  Dr.  Chalmers  condemn  exclu 
sion  of  slave-holders  from  church  fellowship,  while  the 
deputies  who  were  sent  to  the  United  States,  to  raise 
funds,  carefully  avoided  showing  any  sympathy  with 
Abolitionists.  They  thus  managed  to  collect  about 
three  thousand  pounds,  and  a  large  part  of  this  sum 
came  from  South  Carolina,  where  a  white  man  had 
recently  been  sentenced  to  death  for  trying  to  help 
the  woman  he  loved  to  escape  from  slavery.  O'Con- 
nell  had  refused  to  accept  contributions  from  the 
Southern  States,  saying,  "  I  do  not  want  your  blood 
stained  money."  Earnest  appeals  to  do  likewise  were 
made  by  the  women  of  Glasgow,  and  other  friends  of 
the  slave,  to  the  Free  Church,  as  early  as  1844,  but 
the  ministers  were  much  too  shrewd.  The  question 
\vas  of  great  importance,  because  it  involved  that  of 
the  duty  of  the  churches  to  teach  morality  ;  as  well 
as  because  the  most  effective  way  of  turning  public 


122  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

opinion  against  slavery  was  to  disfellowship  slave 
holders.  And  this  course  was  far  less  objectionable 
than  that  of  trying  to  withdraw  from  political  rela 
tions.  The  latter  have  given  the  opportunity  of 
emancipation,  while  the  only  way  in  which  the 
churches  could  exert  any  authority  was  through 
excommunication.  The  religious  relations  with 
slavery  were,  of  course,  the  only  ones  which  ought  to 
have  been  discussed  in  Great  Britain,  where  there 
were  no  political  ones,  except  those  necessary  for  the 
world's  peace. 

Decidedly  too  much,  however,  was  said  in  favor  of 
disunionism  by  Henry  C.  Wright,  in  southern  Scot 
land,  early  in  1846  ;  and  Buffum,  who  went  through 
the  North  and  West  with  Douglass,  used  to  repeat  so 
often  a  story  about  the  hatred  which  he  was  able  to 
call  out  in  Scotland  against  the  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence,  that  I  am  not  altogether  sorry  to  hear  it 
said  that  his  roguish  companion  once  cut  him  out,  by 
going  over  all  his  points  before  he  could  repeat  them. 
At  all  events,  Douglass  himself  kept  true  to  the  real 
issue,  as  may  be  judged  from  a  speech  made  on  Feb 
ruary  10,  at  Arbroath,  where  he  was  charged  with 
being  in  the  pay  of  some  rival  sect.  "  So  far,"  he 
says,  "as  the  charge  is  brought  against  me,  I  pronounce 
it  an  unblushing  falsehood."  ..."  I  am  not  here 
alone,  I  have  with  me  the  learned,  wise  and  reverend 
heads  of  the  church.  But  with  or  without  their  sanc 
tion,  I  should  stand  just  where  I  do  now,  maintaining 
to  the  last  that  man-stealing  is  incompatible  with 
Christianity  ;  that  slave-holding  and  true  religion 
are  at  war  with  each  other,  and  that  a  Free  Church 
should  have  no  fellowship  with  a  slave  church."  .  .  . 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  123 

"The  Free  Church  in  vindicating  their  fellowship  of 
slave-holders,  have  acted  upon  the  damning  heresy, 
that  a  man  may  be  a  Christian,  whatever  may  be  his 
practice,  so  his  creed  is  right.  So  he  pays  tithes  of 
mint,  anise  and  cummin,  he  may  be  a  Christian, 
though  he  totally  neglect  judgment  and  mercy.  It  is 
this  heresy  that  now  holds  in  chains  three  million  of 
men,  women  and  children  in  the  United  States.  The 
slave-holder's  conscience  is  put  at  ease  by  those 
ministers  and  churches." 

In  this  town  the  indignation  was  so  great  that 
people  who  came,  one  Sunday  morning  to  worship  in 
the  Free  Church,  found  that  its  walls  had  been  dec 
orated  during  the  night  with  these  words,  painted 
in  black  letters,  and  not  to  be  effaced,  "  The  Slave's 
Blood,"  while  around  were  red  spots  to  represent  gore. 
Other  churches  bore  in  bloody  characters,  "  Send 
back  the  Slave  Money."  Posters  were  put  on  all  the 
walls,  wherever  he  spoke,  and  even  on  the  pavements, 
repeating  the  words,  "Send  back  the  Money."  In 
fact  the  war-cry  got  so  familiar  to  him  that  he  cut  it 
in  the  turf,  when  he  visited  Arthur's  Seat  in  Edin 
burgh  ;  and  he  still  remembers  a  song,  with  a  chorus 
running  somewhat  thus  : 

"  Where  gat  ye  the  bawbies,  Tammy  ? 
I  dinna  think  they're  canny,"  etc. 

He  was  soon  able  to  report  that  "  Old  Scotland  boils 
like  a  pot."  One  of  the  best  meetings  was  that  in 
Glasgow,  on  April  21,  when  he  complained  that  "  Not 
only  did  the  Free  Church  Deputation  not  preach  the 
Gospel,  or  say  a  word  in  behalf  of  the  slave,  but  they 
took  care  to  preach  such  doctrines  as  would  be 
palatable,  as  would  be  agreeably  received,  and  as  would 


124  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

bring  them  the  slave-holder's  money."  Mr.  George 
Thompson,  a  member  of  Parliament,  whose  presence 
in  Boston  had  done  much  to  excite  the  mob  in  1835, 
and  whose  eloquence  was  still  terrible,  made  that 
night  a  very  effective  speech,  in  which  he  exclaimed, 
"  Oh,  that  a  thousand  pounds  should  out-weigh 
the  chains  of  three  million  slaves  !  "  He  also 
brought  up  the  fact  that  one  of  the  clergymen  who 
was  now  foremost  in  holding  fast  the  price  of  blood, 
Dr.  Cunningham,  had  formerly,  at  his  suggestion, 
reprinted  a  little  book  called  "  A  Picture  of  American 
Slavery,"  and  put  upon  the  title-page  these  lines  : 

"  Is  there  not  some  chosen  curse, 
Some  hidden  thunder  in  the  stores  of  heaven, 
Red  with  uncommon  wrath,  to  blast  the  man 
Who  gains  his  fortune  from  the  blood  of  souls  ?  " 

A  few  days  before  these  speeches  were  delivered, 
Douglass  wrote  a  letter  to  the  "  Tribune,"  which  was 
printed  not  only  there,  but  in  the  "  Liberator,"  and 
which  contains  these  words  : 

"  I  am  called  by  way  of  reproach,  a  runaway  slave, 
as  if  it  were  a  crime,  an  unpardonable  crime,  for  a  man 
to  take  his  inalienable  rights."  He  also  mentions 
having  been  denounced  by  the  "  New  York  Express," 
as  "  a  glib-tongued  scoundrel,"  and  says  he  is  used  to 
such  epithets  ;  and  their  force  is  lost  on  him  ;  for  he 
was  reared  where  they  were  in  the  most  common  use. 
"They  form  a  large  and  very  important  portion  of  the 
vocabulary  of  characters  known  in  the  South  as 
'  plantation  negro  drivers.'  A  slave-holding  gentle 
man  would  scorn  to  use  them." 

The  friends  of  slavery  had  been  so  unwilling  to  see 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  125 

any  truth  in  the  "  Narrative,"  that  its  author  was 
glad  to  have  it  substantially  confirmed  by  an  un 
friendly  witness.  A  Southerner,  named  Thompson, 
who  had  known  him  at  St.  Michael's,  published, 
early  in  1846,  a  letter  which  is  reprinted  in  the  "  Lib 
erator,"  page  29.  He  had  evidently  done  his  best  to 
collect  testimony  ;  but  it  touched  only  two  points  in 
the  statements  of  Douglass,  namely  that  Thomas 
Auld  had  given  him  "a  number  of  severe  whippings," 
and  had  kept  his  slaves  on  very  short  allowance.  In 
a  letter  quoted  by  Thompson,  Auld  says,  "  I  can  put 
my  hand  upon  my  Bible,  and  with  a  clear  conscience 
swear,  that  I  never  struck  him  in  my  life,  nor  caused 
any  person  else  to  do  it.  I  never  allowanced  one  of 
my  slaves."  His  neighbors  speak  of  him  as  a  kind 
master,  who  "  has  invariably  emancipated  his  slaves, 
when  they  arrived  at  the  age  of  twenty-five."  He 
complains  that  Douglass  does  not  mention,  in  the 
"  Narrative,"  that  this  promise  had  been  made  him. 
A  neighbor,  who  had  boarded  with  him,  says,  "  I 
speak  from  personal  knowledge  when  I  say  that  Fred 
and  all  his  servants  were  treated  well.  Indeed,  I 
never  knew  him  to  strike,  much  less  abuse  them.  I 
knew  Fred  well  ;  we  were  boys  together  in  the  same 
family."  It  is  certainly  in  Auld's  favor,  that  he  had 
not  sold  his  slave  to  the  Georgia  traders,  when  he 
first  tried  to  escape,  but  sent  him  to  learn  a  trade  in 
Baltimore  ;  that  he  never  pursued  him  at  the  North  ; 
and  that  he  felt  so  much  aggrieved,  on  account  of 
having  been  misrepresented  that  he  forbade  his  son- 
in-law  to  talk  with  him,  in  1859.  They  did,  however, 
have  a  long  conversation,  in  which  the  young  man 
insisted,  that  Auld  was  really  kind-hearted  and  a 


126  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

good  master.  "  I  replied,"  says  Douglass,  "  that  there 
must  be  two  sides  to  the  relation  of  master  and  slave, 
and  what  seemed  kind  and  just  to  the  one  was  the 
opposite  to  the  other."  On  Auld's  death-bed,  in  1878, 
he  was  reconciled  to  Douglass,  who  admitted  that  he 
had  been  mistaken  in  charging  him,  in  a  letter  writ 
ten  to  him  in  England,  and  published  in  **  Bondage 
and  Freedom,"  with  turning  out  his  grandmother  to 
perish  as  an  outcast,  whereas  he  had  saved  her  from 
this  fate.  Mr.  D.  added  that  "  I  regard  both  of  us  as 
victims  of  a  system."  ("  Life  and  Times,"  pp.  437  and 
491.)  Each  of  the  two  later  autobiographies  speaks 
more  favorably  than  the  earliest  of  Captain  Auld  ; 
but  the  statements  to  which  he  objected  are  repeated; 
and  the  author  declared,  in  1846,  that  he  had  nothing 
to  take  back.  It  seems  to  me  plain,  that  he  did  suffer 
hunger,  though  perhaps  not  from  any  fault  of  his 
master  ;  and  that  he  was  punished  for  stealing  food  ; 
as  his  statements  on  these  points  are  not  only  too 
minute,  but  too  much  against  himself,  to  be  rejected. 
He  also  published,  at  this  time  a  circumstantial 
statement,  that  Thomas  Auld  once  beat  him  with  a 
coach  whip  until  he  was  weary,  and  in  the  presence 
of  a  white  man  whom  he  names,  because  a  carriage 
lamp  had  been  lost  through  no  fault  of  the  victim. 

The  "  Liberator  "  was  soon  able  to  publish  a  letter 
from  a  man  who  knew  the  country  where  Douglass 
was  a  slave.  "I  am  fully  prepared,"  he  says,  "  to 
bear  a  decided  testimony  to  the  truth  of  all  his  asser 
tions  with  regard  to  the  discipline  upon  the  planta 
tions  of  Maryland,  as  wrell  as  his  descriptions  of 
cruelty  and  murder."  It  is  to  be  particularly  noticed 
that  Thompson,  the  American,  makes  no  attempt  to 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  127 

refute  what  is  said  of  Covey,  and  other  wicked 
neighbors,  but  merely  says  they  had  a  good  reputa 
tion  with  other  slave-holders.  So  we  may  take  the 
worst  charges  brought  by  Douglass  against  slavery 
as  substantially  correct.  He  may  have  failed,  as  we 
should  undoubtedly  do,  to  see  all  the  good  points  of 
a  man  who  dared  to  treat  him  as  property  ;  but  he 
had  a  perfect  right  to  say  to  Thompson  : 

"  You  have  completely  tripped  up  the  heels  of  your  pro-slav 
ery  friends,  and  laid  them  flat  at  my  feet.  You  have  done  a 
piece  of  anti-slavery  work  which  no  anti-slavery  man  could  do." 
.  .  .  "  I  am  now  publishing  a  second  edition  of  my  '  Narra 
tive,'  in  this  country,  having  already  disposed  of  the  first.  I 
will  insert  your  article,  with  my  reply,  as  an  appendix." 

He  adds,  with  reference  to  the  timid  way,  in  which 
he  used  to  pass  him  at  St.  Michaels : 

"  If  I  should  meet  you  now,  amid  the  free  hills  of  old  Scot 
land,  where  the  ancient  '  black  Douglas '  once  met  his  foes,  I 
presume  I  might  summon  sufficient  fortitude  to  look  you  in  the 
face  ;  and  were  you  to  attempt  to  make  a  slave  of  me,  it  is  pos 
sible  you  might  find  me  almost  as  disagreeable  a  subject  as  was 
the  Douglas  to  whom  I  have  just  referred." 

How  much  our  black  knight  has  of  what  was  best  in 
ancient  chivalry,  was  shown  while  he  was  traveling 
through  the  Highlands.  It  was  a  rainy  day,  and  he 
was  one  of  the  passengers  who  filled  the  inside  of  the 
coach.  By  and  bye  a  lady  asked  for  a  seat,  but  there 
was  none  vacant  except  on  the  outside.  Then  the 
Douglass  gave  her  his  owrn  place,  and  climbed  up 
himself  to  sit  in  the  rain.  He  did  this  as  a  matter  of 
course,  and  was  surprised  to  find  the  sturdy  Britons 
look  at  him  as  a  second  Don  Quixote.  It  was  not 
their  way  of  treating  women. 


128  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

While  unsuccessful  agitations  were  going  on  in 
Scotland  and  Ireland,  a  great  reform,  destined  to 
bless  all  mankind,  was  finished  triumphantly  in  Eng 
land.  Ever  since  the  beginning  of  the  century  the 
members  of  the  working-classes  had  suffered  pitiably  ; 
and  their  distress  had  been  aggravated  by  the  tariff, 
which  was  laid  on  so  many  articles  as  to  form  an 
almost  complete  list  of  the  world's  products.  Most 
oppressive  of  all  was  the  duty  on  wheat,  which  was 
imposed  for  the  enrichment  of  the  owners  of  land, 
mostly  members  of  the  wealthiest  class,  and  which 
kept  bread  at  starvation  prices.  There  were  also 
heavy  taxes  on  all  manufactured  articles,  as  well  as 
on  raw  materials  ;  and  the  natural  result  was  that  the 
factories  could  not  turn  out  goods  cheaply  enough  to 
send  much  to  foreign  markets.  Thus  there  was  so  little 
demand  for  skilled  labor  as  to  keep  wages  low,  while 
prices  remained  cruelly  high.  It  is  now  many  years 
since  there  has  been  such  destitution  as  in  1841,  when 
there  were  twenty  thousand  people  in  Leeds  who  did 
not  earn  on  the  average  a  shilling  a  week,  while  nearly 
one-fifth  of  the  population  of  Nottingham  was  on  the 
parish.  Fortunately,  the  manufacturers  were  intelli 
gent  enough  to  see  the  real  cause  of  the  people's 
sufferings,  and  generous  enough  to  imperil  their  own 
immediate  interest  for  the  nation's  permanent  good. 
As  early  as  1838  they  united  with  Cobden  and  Bright 
in  the  Anti-Corn  Law  League,  so  called,  it  may  be 
observed,  with  an  especial  view  to  attacking  the 
duties  on  wheat,  which,  with  other  kinds  of  grain,  is 
known  as  "  corn "  in  England.  The  Free-traders 
were  fiercely  opposed,  not  only  by  the  Conservatives, 
but  by  the  Chartists,  who  wished  to  make  everything 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  I  29 

else  give  way  to  their  own  visionary  schemes  ;  but 
the  cause  of  practical  reform  was  carried  steadily 
onward.  Important  reductions  were  made  in  1842 
and  1844  ;  and,  on  June  26, 1846,  the  Corn  Laws  were 
repealed,  and  all  the  other  protective  parts  of  the 
tariff  abandoned.  The  League  dissolved  soon  after, 
and  "  Punch  "  published  a  cartoon,  in  which  it  was 
represented  as  the  magic  staff,  now  broken  by  Pros- 
pero  because  its  work  was  done.  In  another  picture 
the  British  Lion  was  seen,  fattened  on  free  trade  into 
a  strong  resemblance  to  a  prize  pig  at  a  cattle  show. 
And,  as  the  present  condition  of  England  has  been 
badly  misrepresented,  for  the  purpose  either  of 
hindering  a  much  needed  reform,  or  else  of  fostering 
a  fresh  crop  of  visionary  projects,  it  is  well  to  mention 
a  few  significant  facts.  The  average  income  of  fami 
lies  in  the  working-class  has  doubled  since  1840,  as 
has  recently  been  shown  in  the  "  New  York  World," 
by  calculations  based  on  the  British  legacy  and  suc 
cession  returns,  while  the  cost  of  most  of  the  neces 
saries  of  life  has  been  reduced  to  about  one-half  of 
the  old  prices.  There  was  twice  as  much  money 
deposited  in  the  savings  banks,  in  proportion  to  the 
population,  in  1878  as  in  1841  ;  and  the  ability  of  the 
poor  to  purchase  luxuries  has  increased  so  much  as 
to  make  the  average  consumption  of  sugar  five  times 
as  great  in  1887  as  in  1840,  while  that  of  eggs  and 
butter  has  more  than  doubled  The  number  of 
paupers  in  England  and  Wales  fell,  as  is  easily  com 
puted  from  the  "  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,"  during 
the  thirty  years  succeeding  the  abolition  of  pro 
tectionism,  from  one  in  seventeen  of  the  population 
to  one  in  thirty,  and  there  were  less  than  one-half  as 


130  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

many  able-bodied  adults  on  the  parish,  on  a  given 
day  in  1878,  as  in  1849.  Great  Britain,  meantime,  has 
become  the  leading  manufacturer  for  all  nations,  and 
has  had  no  occasion  to  abandon  the  principles  which 
triumphed  in  1846. 

The  men  who  then  insisted  that  legislation  should 
not  be  for  the  protection  of  the  few,  but  of  the  many, 
were  consistent  enough  to  hate  slavery  and  honor  the 
Abolitionists.  Garrison  was  in  favor  of  "  free  trade 
and  free  intercommunication  the  world  over  ;  "  and 
his  adherents  agreed,  for  once,  with  both  Liberty 
party  men  and  Democrats,  in  supporting  that  reduc 
tion  of  our  tariff  which  was  made  this  very  year,  with 
the  best  possible  results  to  all  our  industries.  Eng 
land  looked  back  with  pride  to  the  recent  emancipa 
tion  in  the  West  Indies ;  and  there  was  no  such 
excuse  as  in  Scotland  for  tolerating  slave-holding. 
All  these  circumstances  combined  to  make  the  eleven 
months  which  Douglass  spent  there  one  long  ovation. 
An  invitation  to  speak  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the 
British  and  Foreign  Anti-Slavery  Society,  on  Mon 
day,  May  18,  brought  him  that  day  to  London.  The 
next  night  he  spoke  to  a  Peace  convention  ;  Wed 
nesday,  to  one  for  extending  the  suffrage  to  all  Eng 
lishmen  ;  Thursday,  on  temperance  ;  and  Friday,  at 
a  reception,  the  date  of  which  is  printed  May  12,  in 
"  Bondage  and  Freedom,"  whereas  it  should  be  May 
22.  The  speech,  which  he  made  that  night,  contains 
this  passage  : 

"  I  have  to  inform  you  that  the  religion  of  the  Southern 
States,  at  this  time,  is  the  great  supporter,  the  great  sanctioner 
of  the  bloody  atrocities  to  which  I  have  referred.  While 
America  is  printing  tracts  and  Bibles,  sending  missionaries 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  131 

abroad  to  convert  the  heathen  ;  expending-  her  money  in  vari 
ous  ways  for  the  promotion  of  the  Gospel  in  foreign  lands,  the 
slave  not  only  lies  forgotten,  uncared  for,  but  is  trampled  under 
foot  by  the  very  Church  of  the  land.  What  have  we  in 
America  ?  Why,  we  have  slavery  made  part  of  the  religion  of 
the  land.  Yes,  the  pulpit  there  stands  up  as  the  great  defender 
of  this  cursed  institution,  as  it  is  called.  Ministers  of  religion 
come  forward  and  torture  the  hallowed  pages  of  inspired  wis 
dom  to  sanction  the  bloody  deed.  They  stand  forth  as  the 
foremost,  the  strongest  defenders  of  this  '  institution.'  As  a 
proof  of  this,  I  need  not  do  more  than  state  the  general  fact 
that  slavery  has  existed  under  the  droppings  of  the  sanctuary 
of  the  South  for  the  last  t\vo  hundred  years,  and  there  has  not 
been  any  war  between  the  religion  and  the  slavery  of  the  South. 
Whips,  chains,  gags,  and  thumb-screws  have  all  lain  under  the 
droppings  of  the  sanctuary,  and  instead  of  rusting  from  off  the 
limbs  of  the  bondsmen,  these  droppings  have  served  to  pre 
serve  them  in  all  their  strength.  Instead  of  preaching  the 
Gospel  against  this  tyranny  and  wrong,  ministers  of  religion 
have  sought,  by  all  and  every  means,  to  throw  in  the  back 
ground  whatever  in  the  Bible  could  be  construed  into  oppo 
sition  to  slavery,  and  to  bring  forward  that  which  they  could 
torture  into  its  support.  This  I  conceive  to  be  the  darkest 
feature  of  slavery,  and  the  most  difficult  to  attack,  because  it 
is  identified  with  religion,  and  exposes  those  who  denounce  it 
to  the  charge  of  infidelity.  Yes,  those  with  whom  I  have  been 
laboring,  namely,  the  old  organization  anti-slavery  society  of 
America,  have  been  again  and  again  stigmatized  as  infidels, 
and  for  what  reason  ?  Why,  solely  in  consequence  of  the 
faithfulness  of  their  attacks  upon  the  slave-holding  religion  of 
the  Southern  States,  and  the  Northern  religion  that  sympa 
thizes  with  it.  I  have  found  it  difficult  to  speak  on  this  mat 
ter  without  persons  coming  forward  and  saying,  '  Douglass,  are 
you  not  afraid  of  injuring  the  cause  of  Christ  ?  You  do  not 
desire  to  do  so,  we  know  ;  but  are  you  not  undermining  religion  ?  ' 
This  has  been  said  to  me  again  and  again,  even  since  I 
came  to  this  country  ;  but  I  cannot  be  induced  to  leave  off 


132  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

these  exposures.  I  love  the  religion  of  our  blessed  Saviour.  I 
love  that  religion  that  comes  from  above,  in  the  '  wisdom  of 
God,  which  is  first  pure,  then  peaceable,  gentle,  and  easy  to  be 
entreated,  full  of  mercy  and  good  fruits,  without  partiality,  and 
without  hypocrisy.'  I  love  that  religion  that  sends  its  votaries 
to  bind  up  the  wounds  of  him  that  has  fallen  among  thieves. 
I  love  that  religion  that  makes  it  the  duty  of  its  disciples  to 
visit  the  fatherless  and  the  widow  in  their  affliction.  I  love 
that  religion  that  is  based  upon  the  glorious  principle  of  love 
to  God  and  love  to  man  ;  which  makes  its  followers  do  unto 
others  as  they  themselves  would  be  done  by.  If  you  demand 
liberty  to  yourself,  it  says,  grant  it  to  your  neighbors.  Tf  you 
claim  the  right  to  think  for  yourself,  it  says,  allow  your 
neighbors  the  same  right.  If  you  claim  to  act  for  yourself, 
it  says,  allow  your  neighbors  the  same  right.  It  is  because  I 
love  this  religion  that  I  hate  the  slave-holding,  the  woman- 
whipping,  the  mind-darkening,  the  soul-destroying  religion  that 
exists  in  the  Southern  States  of  America.  It  is  because  I 
regard  the  one  as  good,  and  pure,  and  holy,  that  I  cannot  but 
regard  the  other  as  bad,  corrupt,  and  wicked.  Loving  the  one, 
I  must  hate  the  other  ;  holding  to  the  one,  I  must  reject  the 
other." 

At  the  Peace  convention,  three  days  earlier,  he 
said  : 

"You  may  think  it  somewhat  singular  that  I,  a  slave,  an 
American  slave,  should  stand  forth  at  this  time  as  an  advocate 
of  peace  between  two  countries  situated  as  this  and  the  United 
States  are,  when  it  is  universally  believed  that  a  war  between 
them  would  result  in  the  emancipation  of  three  millions  of  my 
brethren,  who  are  now  held  in  the  most  cruel  bonds  in  that 
country.  I  believe  this  would  be  the  result  ;  but  such  is  my 
regard  for  the  principle  of  peace,  such  is  my  deep,  firm  convic 
tion  that  nothing  can  be  attained  for  liberty  universally  by  war, 
that  were  I  to  be  asked  the  question  whether  I  would  have  my 
emancipation  by  the  shedding  of  one  single  drop  of  blood,  my 
answer  would  be  in  the  negative." 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  133 

This  was  all  the  nobler,  because  he  undoubtedly 
knew  then,  as  is  mentioned  in  a  letter  written  before 
the  end  of  this  week,  that  Hugh  Auld,  who  now 
claimed  him  as  property,  had  publicly  threatened  to 
arrest  him  as  soon  as  he  returned  to  the  United  States, 
and  send  him,  for  the  vindication  of  the  family  honor, 
into  slavery  in  those  regions  where  it  is  most  cruel. 
An  attempt  was  made  at  the  reception  on  Friday 
evening  to  induce  him  to  remain  in  England  ;  and 
money  was  subscribed  for  bringing  over  his  family. 
Reports  soon  reached  Boston  that  he  would  never 
return  ;  but  he  wrote  back  in  July  from  Belfast  that 
"  No  inducement  could  be  offered  strong  enough  to 
make  me  quit  my  hold  upon  America  as  my  home. 
Whether  a  slave  or  a  freeman,  America  is  my  home  ; 
and  there  I  mean  to  spend  and  be  spent  in  the  cause 
of  my  outraged  fellow-countrymen." 

Garrison  had  already  been  invited  by  George 
Thompson  to  come  over  and  assist  in  reorganizing 
the  enemies  of  slavery  in  Great  Britain.  The  night 
before  he  left,  he  said  at  a  reception  given  him  by  the 
colored  people  of  Boston,  in  their  church  in  Belknap 
Street,  that  among  his  reasons  for  going  was  this  :  "  I 
want  to  see  Douglass  ;  and  is  he  not  in  truth  a  man  ? 
What  a  grand  mistake  his  master  made  when  he 
thought  he  was  a  chattel  !  "  Both  champions  were 
soon  obliged  to  draw  the  sword  against  their  own 
countrymen  in  London.  At  the  opening  session  of 
the  World's  Temperance  convention,  August  4,  Gar 
rison  rebuked  a  Boston  clergyman  for  defending 
slavery,  but  was  pronounced  out  of  order,  and  stayed 
away  afterward.  Douglass  was  invited  to  speak  on 
the  night  of  the  yth,  and  called  attention  to  a  fact 


134  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

which  had  not  been  mentioned  by  the  delegates  from 
America.  They  had  said  a  great  deal  in  praise  of 
their  temperance  societies  ;  but  there  were  three 
millions  of  Americans  who  could  not  join  them. 
Slaves  could  not  meet  by  themselves  for  any  purpose  ; 
and  the  attempt  of  the  free  colored  people  to  form 
societies  of  their  own,  had  called  out  a  mob  in 
Philadelphia  on  August  i,  1842,  when  their  proces 
sion  was  broken  up  by  showers  of  stones  and  brickbats  ; 
their  teetotal  banners  were  trampled  in  the  dust  ; 
one  of  their  churches  was  burned  to  the  ground  ;  and 
their  best  temperance  hall  was  demolished.  The 
British  hearers  were  indignant  at  the  outrage,  and  the 
Americans  at  the  orator.  He  said  afterward  that 
"  There  was  one  Doctor  of  Divinity  there,  the  ugliest 
man  I  ever  saw  in  my  life,  who  almost  tore  the  skirt 
of  my  coat  off,  so  vehement  was  he  in  his  friendly 
attempts  to  induce  me  to  yield  the  floor."  The 
audience  was  with  him  by  a  large  majority,  and  he 
was  urged  to  go  on  ;  but  next  morning  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Cox  wrote  to  the  New  York  papers  to  denounce  "  the 
colored  Abolition  agitator  and  ultraist,"  who  had 
ruined  a  moral  scene  which  "  was  superb  and  glorious," 
by  lugging  in  abolitionism,  and  "is  supposed  to  have 
been  well  paid  for  the  abomination."  Douglass 
promptly  denied  this  last  charge  ;  and  accepted  the 
description  "as  a  compliment."  All  he  said  was  fully 
justified  by  "  the  deep  depression  of  the  colored  people 
in  America,  and  the  treatment  uniformly  adopted  by 
white  temperance  societies  toward  them."  "  The 
temperance  cause,"  he  added,  "is  dear  to  me.  I  love 
it  for  myself,  and  for  the  black  man  as  well  as 
for  the  white  man.  I  have  labored  both  in  England 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  135 

and  America  to  promote  the  cause,  and  am  ready  still 
to  labor  ;  I  should  grieve  to  think  of  any  act  of  mine, 
which  would  inflict  the  slightest  ruin  upon  the  cause  ; 
but  I  am  satisfied  that  no  such  injury  was  inflicted." 

This  correspondence  did  much  to  make  Douglass 
favorably  known  in  Europe,  and  so  did  another  con 
troversy  of  his  with  the  same  clergyman.  The  Evan 
gelical  Alliance  was  organized  on  August  19,  by  about 
a  thousand  delegates,  representing  fifty  orthodox 
sects,  and  coming  from  many  lands.  No  slave-holders 
had  been  invited  ;  and  the  question  of  fellowshiping 
them  brought  up  a  discussion,  in  which  almost  all  the 
Americans,  including  Dr.  Beecher,  sided  with  Dr. 
Cox.  What  he  said,  and  how  he  was  answered  else 
where,  are  stated  by  Douglass  in  his  last  speech  in 
London,  thus  : 

"  Dr.  Cox  said  at  the  recent  meeting  of  the  Evangelical  Alli 
ance,  '  I  knew  a  brother  in  the  South,  a  dear  brother,  to  whom  I 
spoke  on  this  subject,  and  I  told  him  what  a  great  sin  I  thought 
it  was  for  him  to  hold  slaves ;  but  he  said  to  me,  "  Brother,  I 
feel  it  as  much  as  you  do  ;  but  what  can  I  do  ?  Here  are  my 
slaves,  take  them.  You  may  have  them.  You  may  take  them 
out  of  the  State,  if  you  please,"  said  he.  I  could  not ;  so  I  left 
them  ;  and  what  would  you  do,  brethren  of  Manchester  and 
Liverpool,  if  you  were  placed  in  such  difficult  circumstances  ?  ' 
There  is  no  truth  in  this  at  all  ;  let  me  tell  you  what  has  been  a 
standing  article  in  anti-slavery  journals  for  the  last  ten  years. 
As  soon  as  the  noble  Gerrit  Smith  and  others  heard  of  this  diffi 
culty,  under  which  the  slave-holders  represented  that  they 
labored,  what  did  they  do  ?  They  inserted  advertisements  in  all 
the  respectable  papers  in  America,  stating  that  there  were  ten 
thousand  dollars  at  the  service  of  any  poor  slave-holders  who 
might  not  have  the  means  of  removing  their  slaves.  Now, 
every  slave-holder  must  have  seen  that,  for  they  find  no  difficulty 


136  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

in  seeing  money  ;  they  must  have  seen  this  ;  but  was  there  ever 
a  demand  for  a  single  red  copper  of  all  those  ten  thousand 
dollars  ?  Never,  never  !  " 

He  also  pointed  out  the  fact  that  there  were  many 
States,  where  slaves  could  be  emancipated  and  not 
sent  away  ;  and  in  reply  to  the  bugbear,  set  up  in  the 
Alliance,  of  negro  pauperism,  he  said  : 

"  I  do  not  know  that  I  ever  saw  a  black  pauper.  In  Philadel 
phia  they  not  only  support  their  own  poor  by  their  own  benevo 
lent  societies,  but  actually  pay  five  hundred  dollars  per  annum 
for  the  support  of  the  white  paupers  of  that  city.  We  do  not 
have  black  paupers.  We  leave  pauperism  to  be  taken  care  of 
by  white  people.  I  mean  no  disrespect  to  my  audience ;  for  I 
have  no  prejudice  against  color." 

Armed  with  facts  like  these,  he  made  what  Garrison 
calls  "  a  very  effective  speech,"  and  was  "  warmly 
applauded."  At  the  meeting  held  on  September  14, 
in  Exeter  Hall,  for  denouncing  the  cowardice  of  the 
Alliance,  by  the  Anti-Slavery  League,  which  had  but 
just  been  formed,  Mr.  Garrison  was  so  bitter  as  to 
call  out  much  opposition  and  disturbance  ;  but 
Thompson  succeeded  in  carrying  the  meeting  with 
him  ;  and  Douglass  brought  it  to  a  triumphant  close. 
The  clergyman  who  edited  a  London  paper,  the 
"Christian  Witness,"  says:  "The  speeches  of  Mr. 
Thompson  and  Mr.  Douglass  were  all  that  could  have 
been  desired.  Both  were  worthy  of  the  occasion." 
He  complains,  however,  that  Garrison  "  seems  to  have 
made  the  science  of  offense  a  special  study,  and  has, 
we  think,  attained  to  very  great  proficiency."  The 
increasing  heterodoxy  of  his  views,  about  the  Bible 
and  the  Sabbath  especially,  helped  to  create  an 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  137 

unpopularity,  which  Douglass  labored  loyally  and 
constantly  to  diminish.  In  one  of  his  latest  speeches, 
this  year,  he  says,  "  I  love  the  Abolitionists  of  Eng 
land  ;  but  they  ask  of  me  too  much,  when  they  desire 
me  to  step  from  the  side  of  Garrison."  He  remarks, 
at  present  that  he  was  one  of  the  most  amiable  of 
men,  to  those  who  agreed  with  him,  and  makes  the 
comparison  between  him  and  Thompson,  that  the 
latter  was  more  of  an  orator  than  of  a  man,  whereas 
Garrison  was  more  of  a  man  than  an  orator. 

Douglass  was  now  a  lion  in  London,  on  account  of 
the  eloquence  of  his  speeches  against  the  Free  Church 
and  the  Alliance,  although  we  cannot,  in  view  of  the 
work  done  by  the  latter  body  against  persecution, 
even  recently,  say,  as  his  admirers  then  did,  that  he 
"  shattered  it  to  atoms."  He  was  hospitably  enter 
tained,  at  the  same  time  as  Andersen,  by  the  Howitts, 
who  "were  among  the  kindliest  people  I  ever  met." 
He  went  with  Garrison  and  Thompson  to  breakfast 
at  Sir  John  Bowring's,  and  also  to  call  on  the  aged 
Abolitionist,  Clarkson,  then  near  his  end.  The 
Chartist  leader,  Lovett,  speaks  of  "  a  very  delightful 
evening,"  when  "Our  friend,  Douglass,  who  had  a  fine 
voice,  sang  a  number  of  negro  melodies,  Mr.  Garri 
son  sang  several  anti-slavery  pieces,  and  our  grave 
friend,  H.  C.  Wright,  sang  an  old  Indian  war-song." 
Do'uglass  also  met  Lord  Brougham  and  Douglas 
Jerrold,  but  he  was  too  much  in  request  for  the  plat 
form  to  be  able  to  meet  many  of  the  literary  cele 
brities,  though  he  must  have  heard  a  great  deal  about 
them,  especially  Carlyle,  Macaulay,  Thackeray,  Dick 
ens,  and  Tennyson.  One  curious  result  of  this  visit 
was  that  a  gentleman,  who  had  come  over  from  one 


138  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

of  our  Southern  States,  was  told  by  an  Englishman, 
who  was  showing  him  his  pictures  and  statues,  "  I 
want  particularly  to  have  you  look  at  my  bust  of  your 
countryman,  Mr.  Douglass."  "  With  the  utmost 
pleasure,"  was  the  reply.  "  Senator  Douglas  is  one 
of  our  most  distinguished  men."  But  the  bust  was 
in  black  marble. 

A  more  practically  useful  form  was  given  to  the 
admiration  for  our  colored  orator,  by  Mrs.  Ellen 
Richardson,  who  now  collected  money  enough  to 
purchase  his  freedom  of  Hugh  Auld.  Garrison  was 
among  the  contributors,  and  also  one  of  the  defenders 
of  this  act  of  generosity,  which  many  Abolitionists 
condemned  as  a  sanction  of  slavery.  Henry  C. 
Wright,  for  instance,  wrote  a  most  earnest  letter, 
advising  his  friend  never  to  make  any  use  of  his  free 
papers.  Douglass  replied  that  it  was  just  as  proper 
for  him  to  protect  himself  by  them,  as  for  Mr.  Wright 
to  protect  himself,  while  traveling  on  the  Continent, 
by  so  far  acknowledging  the  claims  of  the  despots  as 
to  take  out  a  passport.  He  added  : 

"  I  am  free  to  say  that,  had  I  possessed  one  hundred  and 
fifty  pounds,  I  would  have  seen  Hugh  Auld  kicking  before  I 
would  have  given  it  to  him.  I  would  have  waited  till  the 
emergency  came,  and  only  given  the  money  when  nothing  else 
would  do.  But  my  friends  thought  it  best  to  provide  against 
the  contingency.  They  acted  on  their  own  responsibility,  and 
I  am  not  disturbed  about  the  result.  But  having  acted  on  a 
true  principle,  I  do  not  feel  free  to  disavow  their  proceedings." 

He  also  said,  as  the  purchase  continued  to  be 
blamed,  "  I  expected  that  would  be  the  case,  and  I 
deem  no  man  the  less  my  friend,  for  not  being  pleased 
with  it."  The  controversy  seems  to  have  been  finally 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  139 

extinguished  by  a  lady,  who  wrote  to  the  editor  of 
the  "  Liberator  "  : 

"Let  me  beg  of  you  never  to  publish  another  word  in  your 
paper  about  the  ransom  of  Douglass.  I  am  quite  ashamed 
that  our  American  Abolitionists  should  expose  their  narrow 
ness  in  expressing  so  many  regrets  at  their  loss  of  slave 
property  in  Douglass.  They  seem  to  feel  that  he  was  their 
property  and  not  his  own  man." 

After  the  August  meetings  in  London,  where  the 
Slave-holder's  Sermon  was  occasionally  repeated  to 
a  delighted  audience,  we  find  the  two  champions 
from  America  at  Sunderland,  Birmingham,  Wrex- 
ham  (in  Wales),  Manchester,  Glasgow,  Dundee,  and 
Edinburgh.  In  the  last  city  Douglass  was  able  to 
thank  George  Combe  for  what  he  had  learned  from 
the  "  Constitution  of  Man  ;  "  and  he  also  had  the 
pleasure  of  taking  part  in  the  presentation  of  a  silver 
tea-set,  and  a  purse  of  gold,  on  October  21,  to  the 
agitator,  who  on  that  day,  eleven  years  before,  had 
been  dragged  about  by  a  Boston  mob.  On  Novem 
ber  4,  he  led  the  cheering,  when  his  leader  set  out  for 
America,  where  he  had  fresh  experience  of  the 
iniquity  of  custom-houses.  The  letter  in  which 
Lowell  describes  the  Anti-Slavery  Bazaar — among 
whose  treasu-res  wrere  an  unusual  number  of  gifts 
from"  British  friends,  for  instance,  the  pupils  of  the 
Bristol  Blind  Asylum,  who  had  become  deeply 
interested  in  the  black  knight — contains  these  lines  : 

"  There's  Garrison,  his  features  very 
Benign  for  an  incendiary. 
Beaming  forth  sunshine  through  his  glasses 
On  the  surrounding  lads  and  lasses. 


140  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

(No  bee  could  blither  be  or  brisker,) 

A  Pickwick  somehow  turned  John  Ziska, 

His  bump  of  firmness  swelling  up, 

Like  a  rye  cup-cake  from  its  cup. 

And  there,  too,  was  his  English  tea-set, 

Which  in  his  ear  a  kind  of  flea  set, 

His  Uncle  Samuel,  for  its  beauty, 

Demanding  sixty  dollars  duty. 

'T  was  natural  Sam  should  serve  his  trunk  ill, 

For  G.,  you  know,  has  cut  his  uncle." 

Douglass  remained  to  work  in  Great  Britain,  and 
one  of  the  most  active  of  the  Scotch  Abolitionists 
writes  that  "  He  is  greeted  with  rapturous  applause 
wherever  he  goes,  and  cannot  be  spared,  but  must  be 
here  at  least  till  next  summer."  On  the  last  night  of 
1846,  he  said,  at  Newcastle,  that  there  were  three 
million  decided  Abolitionists  in  the  Union,  while  at 
least  forty  periodicals  advocated  the  negro's  cause. 
We  find  that  on  February  9,  1847,  he  "appeared 
thoroughly  worn  out,"  and  that  sixteen  days  later,  at 
Sheffield,  "  Frederick  was  too  ill  from  long  continued 
exertion  to  do  himself  justice  ;  but,  for  the  cause  in 
which  he  so  nobly  labors,  he  pleaded  powerfully." 
In  the  meantime,  one  of  the  most  deeply  respected 
of  the  English  Abolitionists,  Elizabeth  Pease,  wrote 
thus  : 

"  Much  had  I  longed  to  see  this  remarkable  man,  and 
highly  raised  were  my  expectations,  but  they  were  more  than 
realized.  A  living  contradiction  is  he,  truly,  to  that  base 
opinion,  which  is  so  abhorrent  to  every  humane  and  Chris 
tian  feeling,  that  the  blacks  are  an  inferior  race." 

He  spoke  every  night  in  March,  but  was  obliged, 
during  the  last  week,  to  decline  more  than  thirty 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  141 

invitations  to  lecture,  for  it  was  known  that  he  was 
about  to  leave.  At  a  farewell  soiree,  given  in  Lon 
don,  on  March  30,  William  Howitt  said  : 

"  He  has  appeared  in  this  country  before  the  most  accom 
plished  audiences,  who  were  surprised,  not  only  at  his  talent, 
but  at  his  extraordinary  information.  And  all  I  can  say  is, 
I  hope  America  will  continue  to  send  us  such  men  as 
Frederick  Douglass,  and  slavery  will  soon  be  abolished." 

The  orator  himself  began  by  insisting  that  not 
only  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  but  the 
American  churches  deserved  all  that  had  been  said 
against  them,  by  a  man  whose  "  name  is  unjustly 
coupled  with  opprobrium  in  this  country."  .  .  .  "My 
beloved,  my  esteemed,  and  almost  venerated  friend, 
William  Lloyd  Garrison,  who  is  hated  and  despised 
in  this  country,  because  he  has  fearlessly,  on  both 
sides  of  the  Atlantic,  unmasked  their  hypocrisy, 
branded  their  impiety  in  the  language  that  it 
deserves."  The  execration  in  which  Garrison  was 
held  had  somewhat  hindered  his  own  recognition; 
but  he  had  had  sympathy  here  and  cooperation 
there  ;  and  the  number  of  unfriendly  Abolitionists 
was  really  insignificant.  After  an  account,  already 
quoted,  of  his  passage  at  arms  with  Dr.  Cox,  he  went 
on  to  speak  of  his  purchase,  and  remarked  :  "  By  the 
bye, -I  want  to  tell  the  audience  one  thing,  and  that 
is,  that  I  have  just  as  much  right  to  sell  Hugh  Auld 
as  he  had  to  sell  me,  and  if  any  of  you  are  disposed 
to  make  a  purchase  to-night,  just  say  the  word." 

The  conclusion  of  this  speech  is  as  follows  : 

"  Let  me  say  one  word  to  you  on  parting,  for  this  is  probably 
the  last  time  I  will  have  an  opportunity  of  speaking  to  a  Lon- 


142  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

don  audience.  I  came  here  a  slave  ;  I  came  here  degraded  ;  I 
came  here  under  a  load  of  odium  heaped  upon  my  race  by  the 
American  press,  by  the  American  pulpit,  by  the  American 
people ;  I  have  gone  through  this  land  ;  and  I  have  steadily 
increased  the  amount  of  attention  bestowed  upon  this  question 
by  the  British  people.  Wherever  I  have  gone  I  have  been 
treated  with  the  utmost  kindness,  with  the  utmost  deference, 
with  the  utmost  attention.  I  have  reason  to  love  England. 
Truly  liberty  in  England  is  better  than  slavery  in  America  ; 
freedom  at  Hyde  Park  corner  is  better  than  slavery  in  front  of 
the  American  Capitol.  I  have  known  then,  these  last  nine 
teen  months,  what  it  was  for  the  first  time  in  my  life  to  enjoy 
freedom.  Just  before  leaving  Boston  for  this  country  I  was  not 
allowed  to  ride  in  a  public  conveyance ;  I  was  kicked  from  an 
omnibus.  I  was  driven  from  the  lower  floor  of  a  church  because 
I  had  dared  to  enter  there,  forgetting  my  complexion,  remem 
bering  that  I  was  a  man,  and  thinking  I  had  an  interest  in  the 
Gospel  there  proclaimed.  In  my  passage  to  this  country  I  was 
driven  out  of  the  cabin  of  the  steamboat,  out  of  all  respectable 
parts  of  the  ship,  onto  the  floor  of  the  deck,  among  the  cattle — 
not  allowed  to  take  any  place  among  human  beings  as  a  man 
and  a  brother.  I  was  not  allowed  to  go  into  a  menagerie  or  a 
theater,  if  I  wanted  to  go,  nor  to  a  museum,  nor  to  an  Athe 
naeum,  nor  into  a  picture  gallery,  if  I  wished  to  do  so.  I  was  not 
allowed  any  of  these  privileges  ;  I  was  mobbed  ;  I  was  beaten  ; 
I  was  driven,  dragged  out,  insulted,  outraged  in  all  directions  ; 
every  white  man,  no  matter  how  black  his  heart,  could  insult  me 
with  impunity. 

"  I  came  to  this  land — how  great  the  change  !  The  moment 
I  stepped  upon  the  soil  at  Liverpool,  I  saw  people  as  white  as  I 
ever  saw  in  the  United  States,  as  noble  in  their  exterior ;  and, 
instead  of  seeing  the  curled  lip  of  scorn,  the  fire  of  hate  kindled 
in  the  eye  of  the  Englishman,  all  was  respect  and  kindness. 
[Cheers.]  I  looked  around  in  vain  for  the  insult.;  I  looked,  for 
I  hardly  believed  my  eyes ;  I  searched  to  see  if  I  could  see  in 
an  Englishman  any  look  of  disapprobation  of  me  on  account  of 
my  complexion — not  one.  [Loud  cheers.]  I  have  traveled 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  143 

in  all  parts  of  the  country,  in  Ireland,  in  Scotland,  and  in  Eng 
land  and  Wales ;  I  have  traveled  on  highways,  byways,  rail 
ways,  and  steamboats ;  and  in  none  of  these  instances  have  I 
met  anything  I  could  torture  into  an  expression  of  disrespect  of 
me  on  account  of  my  complexion.  [Loud  cheers.]  I  have  visited 
your  Colosseum,  your  Museum,  your  gallery  of  paintings;  I  even 
had  the  pleasure  of  going  into  your  House  of  Commons,  and,  still 
more,  into  the  House  of  Lords,  and  hearing  what  I  never  heard 
before,  and  what  I  had  long  wished  to  hear,  the  eloquence  of 
Lord  Brougham.  [Cheers.]  In  none  of  these  places  did  I 
ever  hear  one  word  of  scorn.  I  have  felt,  however  much  Ameri 
cans  may  affect  to  despise  and  scorn  the  negro,  that  Englishmen 
— the  best  of  Englishmen — do  not  hesitate  to  give  the  right  hand 
of  manly  fellowship  to  such  as  I  am.  [Much  cheering.] 

"  When  I  return  to  the  United  States,  I  will  try  to  impress  them 
with  these  facts,  and  to  shame  them  into  a  sense  of  decency 
upon  this  subject.  Why,  sir,  the  Americans  do  not  know  that  I 
am  a  man  ;  they  think  the  negro  is  something  between  the  man 
and  the  monkey.  The  very  dogs  here,  sir,  know  that  I  am  a  man. 
I  was  at  a  public  meeting  at  Bromley,  the  other  day,  and  while 
I  was  speaking,  a  great  Newfoundland  dog  came  and  put  his 
paws  on  the  platform,  and  gazed  at  me  with  such  interest,  that 
I  could  tell  by  the  very  expression  of  his  eye,  that  he  recognized 
humanity.  [General  laughter.]  I  came  here  a  slave ;  but 
I  go  back  free.  I  came  here  despised  :  I  go  back  with  a  reputa 
tion.  I  am  sure  if  the  Americans  will  believe  one  tithe  of  all 
that  has  been  said  in  this  country  respecting  me,  they  will  cer 
tainly  admit  that  I  am  better  than  I  was.  Though  in  better 
circumstances  than  I  came,  yet  I  go  back  to  toil,  not  to  have  ease 
and  comfort.  Since  I  came  to  this  land  I  have  had  every 
inducement  to  stop  here.  The  kindness  of  my  friends  in  the 
North  has  been  unbounded ;  they  have  proffered  me  every 
inducement  to  bring  my  family  over  to  this  country  ;  they  have 
gone  so  far  as  to  offer  to  give  money  that  they  might  be  brought 
to  this  land  ;  and  I  should  settle  down  here  in  a  different  posi 
tion  from  that  which  I  should  occupy  in  the  United  States  ;  but 
I  prefer  to  live  a  life  of  activity :  I  prefer  to  go  home,  to  go  back 


144  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

to  America.  I  glory  in  the  conflict,  that  I  may  also  glory  in  the 
victory.  I  go  back,  turning  away  from  comfort,  and  ease,  and 
respectabflity  which  I  might  maintain  here:  I  go  back  for  the  sake 
of  my  brethren.  [Cheers.]  I  go  back  to  suffer  with  them,  to 
toil  with  them,  for  that  emancipation  which  is  yet  to  be  achieved 
by  the  power  of  truth  over  the  basest  selfishness.  [Great 
cheering.]  I  go  back  gladly,  I  leave  this  country  for  the  United 
States  on  the  fourth  of  April,  which  is  near  at  hand.  I  feel  not 
merely  satisfied,  but  highly  gratified,  with  my  visit  to  this 
country.  I  will  tell  my  colored  brethren  how  Englishmen  feel 
for  them.  It  will  be  something  to  give  them  patience  under 
their  sorrows,  and  hope  of  a  future  emancipation.  I  shall  try  to 
have  daguerreotyped  upon  my  heart  this  sea  of  up-turned  faces. 
I  will  tell  them  this ;  it  will  strengthen  them  in  their  suffering 
and  in  their  toils ;  and  I  am  sure  in  this  I  have  your  sympathy 
as  well  as  their  blessing.  Pardon  me,  my  friends,  for  the  dis 
connected  manner  in  which  I  have  addressed  you,  but  I  have 
spoken  out  of  the  fulness  of  my  heart ;  as  the  words  came  up,  so 
they  have  been  uttered ;  not  altogether,  perhaps,  so  delicately, 
and  systematically,  and  refinedly  as  they  might  have  been,  but 
still  you  must  take  them  as  they  are.  They  are  the  free  out- 
gushings  of  my  heart,  overborne  with  grateful  emotion  for  the 
kindness  I  have  received  in  this  country,  from  the  day  I  arrived 
here  to  the  present  moment.  With  deepest  gratitude,  fare 
well  ! " 

The  day  after  this  speech  a  letter  was  written  in 
Scotland,  summing  up  his  work  there  thus  : 

"  He  has  divided  the  Free  Church  against  itself  on  account 
of  slavery.  He  has  gained  the  admiration  and  esteem  of  all  the 
friends  of  the  slave  in  this  country.  He  has  always  kept  an 
open  platform,  yet  none  of  the  Rabbis  have  been  found  gal 
lant  enough  to  break  a  lance  with  him.  He  completely 
exploded  their  miserable  attempts  to  reconcile  slavery  with 
Christianity." 

His  last   speech    in   Great   Britain   was   made   on 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  145 

Thursday,  April  i,  at  Bristol,  where  he  said,  "  This 
night,  ten  years  ago,  at  least  the  night  before  Good 
Friday,  I  passed  in  the  woods,  planning  with  four  of 
my  friends  an  escape,  which  proved  unsuccessful." 
A  new  disappointment  was  waiting  for  him. 

He  had  bought  his  ticket  four  weeks  before,  and 
engaged  a  berth  in  the  first  cabin,  on  the  express 
understanding  that  he  was  to  be  treated  as  well,  in 
every  respect,  as  the  other  passengers.  When  he 
reached  Liverpool,  the  day  before  the  steamer  left,  he 
was  told  that  his  berth  would  be  occupied  by  some 
one  else,  and  he  would  have  to  keep  away  from  the 
other  passengers.  The  reason  assigned  was  his  hav 
ing  lectured  against  slavery  on  this  same  vessel, 
nearly  two  years  before.  In  fact,  the  agent,  who 
came  from  one  of  the  Southern  States,  declared  soon 
after,  in  print,  that  he  would  have  acted  just  so  "  if 
he  had  been  the  whitest  man  in  the  world."  He  at 
once  wrote  a  protest,  in  which  he  said,  "  I  have 
traveled  in  this  country  nineteen  months,  and  have 
always  enjoyed  equal  rights  with  other  passengers  ; 
and  it  was  not  until  I  turned  my  face  toward 
America,  that  I  met  with  anything  like  proscription 
on  account  of  my  color."  His  friends  at  once  printed 
this  letter  on  slips,  which  were  sent  to  all  the  British 
papers.  More  than  a  hundred  of  them  published  it 
at  once,  and  there  were  very  severe  editorials  against 
the  Cunard  Company  in  the  London  "Times,"  and  a 
score  of  other  leading  journals.  Douglas  Jerrold, 
for  instance,  was  indignant  at  the  insult  to  "  the  man 
of  color,  whose  eloquence  has  stirred  the  English 
hearts  of  tens  of  thousands  ;  "  and  it  was  only  Ameri 
can  newspapers  which  approved  of  such  treatment  of 


146  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

the  "  negro  impostor."  A  letter  was  published  in 
England,  purporting  to  be  from  a  Virginian,  named 
Burrop,  a  proprietor  in  the  steamship  company,  and 
head-manager,  and  declaring  that  the  exclusion  was 
made  on  the  color  line,  heavy  losses  having  been  sus 
tained  in  consequence  of  acting  otherwise.  But 
these  statements  were  pronounced  entirely  untrue  by 
Mr.  Cunard,  who  also  said  that  he  had  never  heard 
of  Burrop,  and  would  take  care  that  nothing  of  the 
sort  should  happen  again. 

John  Bright  and  his  sisters  made  the  last  night 
which  their  friend  passed  in  England  cheerful,  and 
the  conversation  lasted  until  morning.  It  was  Easter 
Sunday,  April  4, when  he  went  on  board  the  "Cambria." 
The  other  passengers,  especially  the  ladies,  looked  at 
him  with  contempt,  and  he  said  to  the  Britons,  who 
came  to  see  him  off,  "  I  feel,  friends,  and  I  cannot 
help  it,  that  in  leaving  this  country  I  am  going  from 
home  to  a  land  of  oppression  and  slavery — a  land  of 
man-stealers."  Captain  Judkins,  who  had  stood  by 
him  on  the  voyage  out,  was  still  in  command,  and  he 
was  treated  with  the  utmost  politeness  and  kindness 
by  every  one.  His  room  was  the  same  that  had  been 
occupied  shortly  before  by  the  Governor-General  of 
Canada,  and  was  large  enough  for  a  dozen  people  to 
sit  in  ;  but  he  was  treated  as  a  prisoner  of  state, 
obliged  to  eat  by  himself,  and  not  even  permitted  to 
attend  the  religious  services.  He  felt  deeply  the 
humiliation,  but  "  This  I  thought  was  American 
slave-holding  religion  under  British  colors,  and  I  felt 
myself  no  great  loser  at  being  excluded  from  its 
benefits." 

His  sixteen  days  of  solitary  confinement  must  have 


BEYOND    THE    COLOR-LINE.  147 

been  consoled  by  the  recollection  of  what  were  by  far 
the  brightest  scenes  in  his  life,  before  he  reached 
fifty.  He  had  made  a  great  discovery,  whose  import 
ance  is  not  even  yet  recognized  fully.  He  had  proved 
that  the  color-prejudice  is  not  a  universal  character 
istic  of  the  white  race,  too  widely  diffused  and  deeply 
seated  to  stand  much  chance  of  being  eradicated,  but 
merely  a  local  idiosyncrasy,  destined  to  become  obso 
lete,  like  the  peculiar  dialect  in  which  the  u  Biglow 
Papers  "  were  at  this  time  written.  It  is  necessary  in 
"  the  survival  of  the  fittest,"  that  all  national  peculiari 
ties  of  speech,  dress,  food,  amusement,  or  opinion,  not 
limited  by  climate,  should  ultimately  either  become 
universal  and  cosmopolitan,  or  else  disappear  entirely. 
The  color-prejudice  is  only  an  Americanism,  and 
never  can  be  anything  more.  It  may  linger  long 
among  the  uncultivated  ;  but  its  days  are  numbered. 
To  prove  this  was  worth  a  great  deal  to  the  anti- 
slavery  cause  ;  but  otherwise  the  British  sympathy 
called  out  by  Douglass  and  Garrison  was  not,  I  think, 
of  much  value,  especially  as  the  money  was  never  sent 
back  from  Scotland.  Ireland  was  more  responsive  ; 
but  the  example  of  O'Connell  and  Father  Mathew 
does  not  seem  to  have  had  the  slightest  influence  on 
their  admirers  who  emigrated  to  America.  We  shall 
find  George  Thompson  treated  all  the  worse  in 
Boston  in  1850,  because  he  was  an  ambassador  from 
most  of  the  respectable  men  and  women  in  England. 
The  fathers  of  the  men  who  now  seem  to  think  that 
the  principles  of  civil  service  reform  and  free  trade  are 
false  and  dangerous  here,  because  they  have  been 
found  true  and  beneficial  in  Great  Britain,  hated  "the 
nigger,"  Douglass,  all  the  more  bitterly  after  they  saw 


148  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

him  honored  by  the  Britishers.  I  doubt  if  a  single 
hunker  would  have  been  converted  by  hearing  that 
the  "Liberator"  had  got  a  hundred  thousand  sub 
scribers  in  England  ;  and  the  amount  of  national  aid 
which  came  across  the  water  to  Boston  does  not  seem 
to  have  been  very  great.  I  find  no  record  of  any 
other  contributions  so  large  as  that  which  purchased 
freedom  for  Douglass,  and  that  which,  as  we  shall 
see,  soon  enabled  him  to  publish  a  newspaper,  whose 
name  furnishes  a  title  for  our  next  chapter. 


CHAPTER   VI. 

THE    "NORTH   STAR.'' 

WHEN  Douglass  returned  to  the  United  States, 
April  20,  1847,  he  brought  with  him  the  news  that  the 
lady  who  had  made  him  legally  free,  Mrs.  Ellen 
Richardson,  of  Newcastle,  had  just  opened  a  sub 
scription  for  a  newspaper,  which  he  should  edit  in 
the  interest  of  colored  people.  He  had  at  first  made 
several  objections.  His  friends  in  Boston  might  not 
like  it  ;  the  average  American  would  be  prejudiced 
against  any  enterprise  started  by  British  capital  ;  he 
did  not  himself  like  a  sedentary  life;  and  money  was 
more  needed  in  Ireland,  just  then,  than  in1  America. 
^All  these  objections  were  outweighed,  however,  by 
the  zeal  of  his  English  friends,  and  the  subscription 
was  likely  to  be  a  success.  The  time  was  propitious 
for  several  reasons.  His  victories  abroad  enabled 
him  to  return  in  triumph.  The  war  which  had  been 
undertaken  against  Mexico,  for  the  extension  of 
slavery,  had  now  assumed  a  character  of  such  atrocity 
as  to  justify  the  opening  against  it  of  a  new  battery, 
especially  as  Lowell  and  Whittier  were  furnishing 
abundance  of  ammunition.  And  the  discontinuance 
of  the  "  Herald  of  Freedom,"  in  1846,  had  left  a  gap 
which  ought  to  be  speedily  filled. 

The  prisoner  on  the  "Cambria"  had  consoled  himself 
149 


150  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

by  visions  of  what  he  was  about  to  do  for  his  race, 
when  he  could  use  his  pen  as  well  as  his  voice,  and 
reach  constantly  all  who  sympathized  with  him, 
instead  of  only  scattered  portions  intermittently.  He 
was  sadly  perplexed  and  disappointed  at  finding 
Garrison  and  the  other  Boston  Abolitionists  insist 
that  he  was  better  fitted  for  speaking  than  writing  ; 
that  editing  a  paper  would  interfere  with  his  useful 
ness  as  a  lecturer;  and  that  there  was  no  room  for 
another  anti-slavery  journal.  The  field  seemed,  in 
fact,  pretty  full,  as  three  new  ones  had  been  started 
that  very  year  by  the  colored  people,  who  are  said  to 
have  got  out  as  many  as  a  hundred  before  1855.  The 
first  on  the  list  is  dated  as  early  as  1827  ;  and  twenty 
years  later  I  find  that  the  "  Ram's  Horn  "  was  in  full 
blast  ;  the  "  Mystery  "  was  awaiting  its  solution  or 
dissolution  ;  the  "  National  Watchman  "  was  going 
its  rounds  busily  ;  the  "  Disfranchised  American  " 
was  on  the  war  path;  and  the  "Northern  Star  and 
Colored  Farmer"  was  shining  under  the  direction  of 
the  black  pastor  of  a  white  congregation,  Rev.  S. 
R.  Ward,  who  evidently  believed  that  every  farmer 
should  hitch  his  wagon  to  a  star.  The  "  Elevator," 
however,  was  not  running;  the  "  Struggler "  had 
either  ceased  or  not  begun  to  struggle;  and  the 
"  Palladium  of  Liberty  "  had,  I  fear,  been  captured 
by  the  enemy,  in  company  with  the  "  Demosthenian 
Shield."  But  at  all  events,  there  were  now  so  many 
rivals  to  the  proposed  paper,  and  there  had  been  so 
many  failures  in  this  quarter,  that  the  enterprise 
naturally  seemed  perilous.  How  far  Garrison  was 
influenced  by  determination  that  there  should  be 
order  in  the  ranks,  it  is  hard  to  say.  The  fact  which 


THE  ''NORTH  STAR."  151 

he  brought  forward  in  July,  that  he  once  had  four 
hundred  colored  subscribers  in  New  York  City,  and 
as  many  in  Philadelphia,  and  now  had  not  half-a- 
dozen  in  either  place,  was  really  a  much  more  favor 
able  indication  than  he  represented  it  to  be  for  Doug 
lass  ;  and  I  hardly  think  Garrison  had  a  right  to  say 
that  "  It  is  quite  impracticable  to  combine  the  editor 
with  the  lecturer,  without  either  causing  the  paper 
to  be  more  or  less  neglected,  or  the  sphere  of  lectur 
ing  to  be  seriously  circumscribed."  He  had  himself 
been  so  successful  in  making  his  lecturing  and  his 
editing  help  each  other,  that  it  is  a  great  pity  that  he 
did  not  promptly  and  cordially  urge  his  young  friend 
and  disciple  to  go  and  do  likewise.  He  declared  in 
the  "  Liberator,"  before  the  money  had  been  sent 
over,  that  he  considered  "  such  a  present  inexpedient ;  " 
and  two  days  later,  June  27,  Douglass  wrote  a  letter 
for  publication,  in  which  he  said,  u  I  have,  with  some 
reluctance,  given  up  the  idea  of  publishing  a  paper 
for  the  present."  Four  weeks  later,  in  consequence 
of  suggestions  that  he  had  been  unduly  influenced, 
he  stated  that  he  had  acted  "  wholly  on  my  own 
responsibility  ;  "  but  it  was  mainly  due  to  Garrison 
that  the  publication  of  the  "  North  Star  "  was  delayed 
nearly  a  year  ;  and  it  finally  had  to  appear  without 
his  approbation. 

Our  Douglass  has  so  noble  a  nature  that  no  opposi 
tion  could  damp  his  zeal  for  his  race.  The  "  Boston 
Post  "  mentioned,  in  May,  that  "  The  Abolitionists, 
headed  by  Mr.  William  Lloyd  Garrison,  and  tailed  by 
Mr.  Frederick  Douglass,  the  fugitive  slave,  are  in  full 
blast  at  the  Broadway  Tabernacle."  It  is  further 
stated  of  Douglass  that  he  "  elaborates  very  eloquently 


152  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

and  fearfully;  "  that  he  is  "  a  good  deal  of  a  demagogue 
in  black,"  and  also  that  he  "  was  armed  to  the  teeth, 
and  was  in  fact  a  walking  San  Juan  de  Ulloa."  There 
was  an  attempt  to  silence  him  by  force.  But  he  did 
not  hesitate  to  support  Garrison's  resolution  against 
a  proposal  to  give  the  Bible  to  the  slaves,  who  ought 
first  to  have  a  chance  to  learn  how  to  read  it  ;  and  he 
declared  that  "The  only  thing  that  links  me  to  this 
land  is  my  family,  and  the  painful  consciousness  that 
here  .there  are  three  million  of  my  fellow-creatures, 
groaning  beneath  the  iron  rod  of  the  worst  despotism 
that  could  be  devised,  even  in  Pandemonium."  He 
then  took  up  the  charge  that  he  had  irritated  the 
American  people  and  said,  "  I  admit  that  we  have 
irritated  them.  They  deserve  to  be  irritated."  .  .  . 
"  The  conscience  of  the  American  public  needs  this 
irritation  ;  and  I  would  blister  it  all  over  from  center 
to  circumference."  The  New  York  "  Sun  "  complained 
that  he  had  acted  as  ungratefully  toward  the  country 
which  protected  him,  as  if  he  had  accepted  a  gentle 
man's  hospitality  and  abused  the  fare  ;  but  he  wrote 
from  Lynn,  on  May  18,  a  letter  for  the  "  Ram's  Horn," 
in  which  he  suggests  to  the  editor  of  the  "  Sun  "  that 

"  A  cook-shop  (a  thing  which  I  am  surprised  he  should  ever 
forget)  bears  a  far  greater  resemblance  to  the  government  of  this 
country  than  that  of  a  gentleman's  house  and  hospitality.  Let 
'Cook-shop  '  represent  'Country' — '  Bill  of  Fare,' '  Bill  of  Rights,' 
and  the  '  Chief  Cook,'  '  Commander-in-Chief.'  Enters  editor  of 
'  Sun  '  with  a  keen  appetite.  He  reads  the  bill  of  fare.  It  con 
tains  the  names  of  many  palatable  dishes.  He  asks  the  cook 
for  soup ;  he  gets  dish-water.  For  salmon,  he  gets  a  serpent ; 
for  beef,  he  gets  bull-frogs  ;  for  ducks,  he  gets  dogs  ;  for  salt,  he 
gets  sand  ;  for  pepper,  he  gets  powder  ;  and  for  vinegar,  he  gets 


THE    "NORTH    STAR."  153 

gall."  ..."  This  is  just  the  treatment  which  the  colored 
people  receive  in  this  country  at  the  hand  of  this  government. 
Its  Bill  of  Rights  is  in  practice  toward  us  a  bill  of  wrongs. 
Its  self-evident  truths  are  self-evident  lies."  ..."  The  great 
Constitution  itself  is  nothing  more  than  a  compromise  with 
man-stealers,  and  a  cunningly  devised  complication  of  false 
hoods,  calculated  to  deceive  foreign  nations  into  a  belief 
that  this  is  a  free  country  ;  at  the  same  time  that  it  pledges  the 
whole  civil,  naval,  and  military  power  of  the  nation  to  keep  three 
millions  of  people  in  the  most  abject  slavery.  He  says  I  abuse 
a  country  under  whose  government  I  am  safely  residing  and 
securely  protected.  I  am  neither  safely  residing  nor  securely 
protected  in  this  country.  I  am  living  under  a  government  which 
authorized  Hugh  Auld  to  steal  seven  hundred  and  fifty  dollars 
from  me,  and  told  me  if  I  did  not  submit,  if  I  resisted  the  robber, 
I  should  be  put  to  death.  This  is  the  protection  given  to  me  and 
every  other  colored  man  from  the  South  ;  and  nobody  knows 
this  better  than  the  editor  of  the  '  Sun.'  And  this  piece  of 
robbery  the  '  Sun  '  calls  '  the  rights  of  the  master,'  and  says  that 
the  English  people  recognized  those  rights  by  giving  me  money 
with  which  to  purchase  my  freedom.  The  '  Sun '  complains 
that  I  defend  the  right  of  invoking  England  for  the  overthrow 
of  American  slavery.  Why  not  receive  aid  from  England  to 
overthrow  American  slavery,  as  well  as  for  Americans  to  send 
bread  to  England  to  feed  the  hungry  ?  Answer  me  that !  " 

Another  New  York  paper,  very  felicitously  entitled 
the  "  Subterranean,"  was  provoked  by  his  having 
"  reiterated  his  slanders  in  an  obscure  gathering  of 
fanatics  in  this  city,"  into  calling  him  a  "  semi- 
baboon,"  and  "a  most  repulsive-looking  darkey." 

When  the  New  England  Convention  met  at  Boston 
in  Anniversary  Week,  he  was  elected  president,  but 
was  kept  away  by  a  "  severe  indisposition."  On  June 
17,  he  gave  an  account  of  his  visit  to  England,  at  Fall 
River;  and  on  July  3  and  4,  he  took  part  at  Plymouth 


154  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

in  a  discussion  about  a  resolution,  finally  laid  on  the 
table,  and  meant  to  incite  the  slaves  to  insurrection. 
In  August  and  September  he  took  a  journey,  of  which 
he  does  not  speak  in  his  autobiographies  ;  but  his 
companion,  Mr.  Garrison,  has  left  a  full  account  in 
letters,  from  which  I  take  these  extracts.  ("  William 
Lloyd  Garrison  :  the  Story  of  his  Life.  Told  by  his 
Children."  Vol.  iii.,  pp.  189-205)  : 

"  August  7. 

"  Our  three  days'  meeting  at  Norristown  closed  last  evening, 
and  a  famous  time  we  have  had  of  it.  Every  day  two  or  three 
hundred  of  our  friends  from  Philadelphia  came  up  in  the  cars, 
and  the  meetings  were  uniformly  crowded  by  "ah  array  of  men 
and  women  who,  for  thorough-going  anti-slavery  spirit  and 
solidity  of  character,  are  not  surpassed  by  any  in  the  world. 
Douglass  arrived  on  the  second  day,  and  was  justly  the  '  lion ' 
of  the  occasion  ;  though  a  considerable  number  participated  in 
the  discussions,  our  friend  Lucretia  Mott  speaking  with  excel 
lent  propriety  and  effect.  Thomas  Earle  was  present  to  annoy 
us,  as  usual.  Our  meetings  were  not  molested  in  any  manner, 
excepting  one  evening,  when  Douglass  and  I  held  a  meeting 
after  dark,  when  a  few  panes  of  glass  were  broken  by  some 
rowdy  boys  while  D.  was  speaking.  It  was  a  grand  meeting, 
nevertheless,  and  the  house  crowded  with  a  noble  auditory  to 
the  end.  The  meetings  will  have  a  powerful  effect  in  the  prose 
cution  of  our  cause  for  the  coming  year.  It  was  worth  a  trip 
from  Boston  to  Norristown  merely  to  look  at  those  who  assem 
bled  on  the  occasion." 

"  HARRISBURG,  August  9,  1847. 

"  On  Saturday  morning,  Douglass  and  I  bade  farewell  to  our 
kind  friends  in  Philadelphia,  and  took  the  cars  for  this  place 
— a  distance  of  106  miles.  Before  we  started,  an  incident 
occurred  which  evinced  something  of  that  venomous  pro-slavery 
spirit  which  pervades  the  public  sentiment  in  proportion  as  you 
approach  the  borders  of  the  slave  States.  There  is  no  distinc- 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR."  155 

tion  made  at  Philadelphia  in  the  cars  on  account  of  complexion, 
though  colored  persons  usually  sit  near  the  doors.  Douglass 
took  a  seat  in  one  of  the  back  cars  before  I  arrived,  and,  while 
quietly  looking  out  at  the  window,  was  suddenly  accosted  in  a 
slave-driving  tone,  and  ordered  to  '  get  out  of  that  seat/  by  a 
man  who  had  a  lady  with  him,  and  who  might  have  claimed  the 
right  to  eject  any  other  passenger  for  his  accommodation  with 
as  much  propriety.  Douglass  quietly  replied,  that  if  he  would 
make  his  demand  in  the  form  of  a  gentlemanly  request,  he 
would  readily  vacate  his  seat.  His  lordly  commander  at  once 
laid  violent  hands  upon  him,  and  dragged  him  out.  Douglass 
submitted  to  this  outrage  unresistingly,  but  told  his  assailant 
that  he  behaved  like  a  bully,  and  therefore  precluded  him  (D.) 
from  meeting  him  with  his  own  weapons.  The  only  response  of 
the  other  was  that  he  would  knock  D.'s  teeth  down  his  throat 
if  he  repeated  the  charge.  The  name  of  this  man  was  soon 
ascertained  to  be  John  A.  Fisher,  of  Harrisburg,  a  lawyer,  and 
the  only  palliation  (if  it  be  one)  that  I  hear  offered  for  his  con 
duct  is,  that  he  was  undoubtedly  under  the  influence  of  intoxi 
cating  liquor.  This  was  a  foretaste  of  the  violence  to  be 
experienced  on  our  attempting  to  lecture  here,  and  which  I 
anticipated  even  before  I  left  Boston. 

"  The  Court  House  had  been  obtained  for  us  for  Saturday 
and  Sunday  evenings.  Hitherto,  nearly  all  the  anti-slavery 
lecturers  have  failed  to  gather  any  considerable  number 
together ;  but,  on  this  occasion,  we  had  the  room  filled,  some 
of  the  most  respectable  citizens  being  present.  At  an  early 
period  of  the  evening,  before  the  services  commenced,  it  was 
evident  that  mischief  was  brewing,  and  an  explosion  would 
ultimately  follow.  I  first  addressed  the  meeting,  and  was 
listened  to,  not  only  without  molestation,  but  with  marked 
attention  and  respect,  though  my  remarks  were  stringent,  and 
my  accusations  severe.  As  soon,  however,  as  Douglass  rose 
to  speak,  the  spirit  of  rowdyism  began  to  show  itself  out 
side  of  the  building,  around  the  door  and  windows.  It  was 
the  first  time  that  a  '  nigger  '  had  attempted  to  address  the 
people  of  Harrisburg  in  public,  and  it  was  regarded  by  the 


156  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

mob  as  an  act  of  unparalleled  audacity.  They  knew  nothing 
at  all  of  Douglass,  except  that  he  was  a  '  nigger.'  They  came 
equipped  with  rotten  eggs  and  brickbats,  fire-crackers,  and 
other  missiles,  and  made  use  of  them  somewhat  freely — 
breaking  panes  of  glass,  and  soiling  the  clothes  of  some  who 
were  struck  by  the  eggs.  One  of  these  bespattered  my  head 
and  back  somewhat  freely.  Of  course,  there  was  a  great 
deal  of  yelling  and  shouting,  and  of  violent  exclamation — 
such  as,  '  Out  with  the  damned  nigger,'  etc.,  etc.  The 
audience  at  first  manifested  considerable  alarm,  but  I  was 
enabled  to  obtain  a  silent  hearing  for  a  few  moments,  when 
I  told  the  meeting  that  if  this  was  a  specimen  of  Harrisburg 
decorum  and  love  of  liberty,  instead  of  wasting  our  breath 
upon  the  place,  we  should  turn  our  back  upon  it,  shaking  off 
the  dust  of  our  feet,"  etc.,  etc. 

"  PITTSBURGH,  August  12,  1847. 

"  I  endeavored  to  complete  a  letter  for  you  at  Harrisburg, 
before  leaving  for  this  place,  on  Monday  morning,  but  was  able 
to  write  only  a  portion  of  one  before  it  was  time  to  be  at  the 
depot.  In  my  perplexity,  not  knowing  what  else  to  do,  I 
requested  a  colored  friend  to  finish  my  letter,  explaining  to  you 
the  reason  why  he  did  so,  and  put  it  into  the  post-office.  He 
promised  to  do  so,  and  I  hope  was  faithful  to  his  promise.  As 
I  left  off  just  as  I  was  giving  you  the  particulars  of  the  rowdy- 
ish  outbreak  at  our  meeting  at  H.,  I  requested  Mr.  Brown  to 
mention  that  no  attempt  was  made  to  molest  me,  and  that 
Douglass  escaped  without  any  serious  injury,  although  he  was 
struck  in  the  back  by  a  stone,  and  a  brickbat  just  grazed  his 
head.  All  the  venom  of  the  rowdies  seemed  to  be  directed 
against  him,  as  they  were  profoundly  ignorant  of  his  character. 
.  .  .  On  Sunday  forenoon  and  afternoon  we  addressed  our 
colored  friends  in  their  meeting-house  at  H.,  at  which  a  number 
of  white  ones  were  also  present.  The  meetings  were  crowded, 
and  a  most  happy  time  we  had  indeed.  Not  the  slightest 
molestation  was  offered. 

"  On  Monday  we  left  Harrisburg  in  the  cars  for  Chambersburg, 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR."  157 

a  distance  of  fifty-four  miles.  On  arriving,  to  our  serious  regret, 
we  found  that  the  ticket  which  Douglass  obtained  at  H.  for 
Pittsburgh,  enabled  him  to  go  directly  through  in  the  2  o'clock 
stage,  while  I  should  be  compelled  to  wait  until  8  o'clock  (it 
proved  to  be  1 1  o'clock)  in  the  evening.  This  \vas  annoying 
and  unpleasant  in  the  extreme.  Douglass  had  a  hard  time  of 
it,  after  we  parted.  The  route  over  the  Alleghany  Mountains, 
although  a  very  beautiful  and  sublime  one,  is  a  very  slow  and 
difficult  one,  and  with  a  crowded  stage,  in  a  melting  hot  day,  is 
quite  overpowering.  It  seemed  to  me  almost  interminable — 
almost  equal  to  a  trip  across  the  Atlantic.  Douglass  was  not 
allowed  to  sit  at  the  eating  table  on  the  way,  and  for  two  days 
and  nights  scarcely  tasted  a  morsel  of  food.  O,  what  brutality  ! 
Only  think  of  it,  and  then  of  the  splendid  reception  given  to  him 
in  all  parts  of  Great  Britain !  On  his  arriving  at  Pittsburgh, 
however,  a  different  reception  awaited  him,  which  was  also 
intended  for  me.  A  committee  of  twenty  white  and  colored 
friends,  with  a  colored  band  of  music,  who  had  sat  up  all  night 
till  three  o'clock  in  the  morning,  met  him  to  welcome  him  to  the 
place,  and  to  discourse  eloquent  music  to  him.  Of  course,  they 
were  greatly  disappointed  at  my  not  coming  at  that  time. 

"  I  arrived  toward  evening,  entirely  exhausted,  but  soon  recov 
ered  myself  by  a  good  warm  bath.  A  meeting  had  been  held  in 
the  afternoon  in  the  Temperance  Hall,  which  was  ably 
addressed  by  Douglass.  In  the  evening  we  held  one  together 
in  the  same  place,  crowded  to  overflowing. — [August  13.]  Yes 
terday,  Friday,  [Thursday],  we  held  three  large  meetings,  two 
of  them  in  the  open  air,  and  concluded  last  night  with  the 
greatest  enthusiasm.  I  have  seen  nothing  like  to  it  on  this  side 
of  the  Atlantic.  The  place  seems  to  be  electrified,  and  the  hearts 
of  many  are  leaping  for  joy." 

On  Wednesday,  August  18,  they  took  part  in  the 
mass-meeting  of  the  Western  Anti-Slavery  Society,  at 
New  Lyme,  a  village  in  the  Northeastern  corner  of 
Ohio.  The  great  Oberlin  tent,  "  capable  of  holding 


158  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

four  thousand  persons,"  had  been  put  up  ;  many 
prominent  members  of  the  Liberty  party  were  on  the 
ground  ;  and 

"  Notwithstanding  the  unpropitious  state  of  the  weather,  at 
an  early  hour  vehicles  of  various  descriptions  began  to  pour  into 
the  place  in  great  numbers.  We  held  two  meetings  in  the  ten, 
on  the  first  day,  which  were  attended  by  a  large  concourse 
among  them  some  of  the  choicest  friends  of  our  cause  in  the 
land — ay,  and  the  choicest  women,  too.  Messrs.  Giddings  and 
Tilden,  members  of  Congress,  who  have  nobly  battled  for  free 
dom  in  that  body,  were  also  present.  After  the  organization  of 
the  meeting,  a  poetical  welcome  to  Douglass,  Foster,  and  myself, 
written  by  Benjamin  S.  Jones,  was  sung  with  exquisite  taste 
and  feeling  by  a  choir,  causing  many  eyes  to  be  moistened  with 
tears.  I  then  addressed  the  great  multitude  at  considerable 
length,  and  was  followed  by  Douglass  in  a  capital  speech.  In 
the  afternoon  we  again  occupied  the  most  of  the  time.  The 
interest  manifested,  from  beginning  to  end,  was  of  the  most 
gratifying  character,  and  all  seemed  refreshed  and  greatly 
pleased.  As  the  night  approached,  there  appeared  to  be  some 
symtoms  of  rowdyism,  and  it  became  necessary  for  some  of 
our  friends  to  watch  all  night,  lest  the  tent  should  be  damaged. 

"  Yesterday,  all  day,  our  meetings  were  still  more  thronged — 
four  thousand  persons  being  on  the  ground.  The  disunion 
question  was  the  principal  topic  of  discussion,  the  speakers 
being  Douglass,  Foster,  and  myself,  in  favor  of  disunion,  and 
Mr.  Giddings  against  it.  Mr.  G.  exhibited  the  utmost  kindness 
and  generosity  toward  us,  and  alluded  to  me  in  very  handsome 
terms,  as  also  to  Douglass;  but  his  arguments  were  very  specious; 
and  I  think  we  had  with  us  the  understanding  and  conscience 
of  an  overwhelming  majority  of  those  who  listened  to  the  debate. 
As  a  large  proportion  of  the  Abolitionists  in  this  section  of  the 
country  belong  to  the  Liberty  party,  we  have  had  to  bring  them 
to  the  same  test  of  judgment  as  the  Whigs  and  the  Democrats, 
for  supporting  a  pro-slavery  Constitution  ;  but  they  are  generally 


THE  "NORTH  STAR."  159 

very  candid,  and  incomparably  more  kind  and  friendly  to  us 
than  those  of  their  party  at  the  East. 

"To-day  (Friday),  we  shall  close  this  cheering  anniversary; 
after  which,  Douglass  and  I  must  ride  forty  miles  to  attend 
another  convention  at  Painesville,  which  commences  to-morrow 
morning  at  10  o'clock;  at  the  conclusion  of  which  we  must 
take  another  long  jaunt,  to  hold  meetings  on  Sunday  at  Munson. 
Our  friends  here  have  so  multiplied  the  meetings  that  not  an 
hour  is  left  us  for  rest.  They  are  unmerciful  to  us,  and  how  we 
are  to  fulfill  all  the  engagements  made,  without  utterly  breaking 
down,  I  do  not  know.  Douglass  is  not  able  to  speak  at  any 
length  without  becoming  very  hoarse,  and,  in  some  cases,  losing 
the  ability  to  make  himself  heard. 

"  Up  to  the  last  hour"  [says  a  later  letter  to  Mrs.  Garrison]  "  the 
audience  was  immense.  We  adjourned  at  half-past  two  o'clock 
P.  M.,  and  were  then  busily  engaged  for  some  time  in  shaking 
hands  and  bidding  farewell  to  a  host  of  friends.  When  the 
dense  mass  moved  off  in  their  long  array  of  vehicles,  dispersing 
in  every  direction  to  their  several  homes,  some  a  distance  of 
ten,  others  of  twenty,  others  of  forty,  others  of  eighty,  and 
others  of  a  hundred  miles,  it  was  a  wonderful  spectacle.  One 
man  (colored)  rode  three  hundred  miles  on  horseback  to  be  at 
the  meeting." 

On  they  went  to  Painesville,  where  "  Frederick's 
voice  was  much  impaired,  and  he  had  to  have  a  bad 
tooth  extracted  during  the  meeting."  Then  they 
came  on  Sunday,  August  22,  to  Munson,  where 

"  We  saw  the  great  Oberlin  tent  in  a  distant  field  ;  but  no 
village  was  to  be  seen,  and  only  here  and  there  a  solitary  log 
cabin.  '  Strange,'  said  I  to  myself,  '  that  our  friends  should 
pitch  their  tent  in  such  a  place.  From  whence  are  we  to  get 
our  audience  ?  '  But,  on  going  to  the  spot,  I  found  a  large 
company  already  assembled,  and  in  a  short  time  the  vast  tent 
was  densely  filled,  even  to  overflowing;  so  that  the  multitude 
was  greater  than  we  had  even  at  New  Lyme.  It  was  a  grand 


r6o  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

and  imposing  spectacle.  Poor  Frederick  was  still  unwell,  and 
could  only  say  a  few  words  in  the  forenoon  ;  and  in  the  after 
noon  he  absented  himself  altogether  from  the  meeting,  and  put 
a  wet  bandage  round  his  throat.  This  threw  the  labor  mainly 
upon  me,  though  our  sterling  friends,  S.  S.  Foster  and  J.  W. 
Walker,  made  long  and  able  speeches,  which  aided  me  consid 
erably.  The  enthusiasm  was  general  and  very  great.  We 
continued  our  meeting  through  the  next  day,  with  a  large  and 
most  intelligent  audience,  and  made  a  powerful  impression. 
Douglass  was  much  improved,  and  spoke  with  inimitable  humor, 
showing  up  the  religion  of  the  South  in  particular,  and  of  the 
country  in  general.  At  the  close,  Dr.  Richmond  (one  of  our 
most  intelligent  and  active  come-outers,  last  from  the  Liberty 
party)  offered  a  series  of  resolutions,  strongly  commendatory  to 
Douglass  and  myself,  which  were  unanimously  adopted  by  a 
tremendous  '  Ay ! ' — after  which  six  cheers  were  given  in  the 
heartiest  manner.  Altogether,  it  was  the  most  interesting  meet 
ing  I  have  ever  attended  in  this  country.  .  .  ." 

That  week  they  attended  commencement  at  the 
famous  anti-slavery  college,  Oberlin,  where  among  the 
graduates  of  this  year  they  met  Miss  Lucy  Stone. 
Nearly  three  thousand  people  listened  to  their  debate, 
with  President  Mahan,  who  defended  the  Consti 
tution  of  the  United  States  as  anti-slavery.  Then 
came  one  immense  meeting  after  another  in  various 
places,  including  Salem,  where  "  The  rain  poured 
down  in  torrents,  giving  us  all  a  pretty  thorough  bap 
tism  ;  but  the  people  would  not  disperse  ;  and  we 
looked  the  storm  out  of  countenance  and  wound  up 
gloriously."  Their  arrival  in  Cleveland  had  been 
announced  in  one  of  the  Liberty  party  organs,  the 
"  Plain  Dealer,"  by  a  paragraph  headed,  "  The  Men 
agerie  Coming,"  and  saying  that  "  Garrison,  Doug 
lass,  Foster,  (and,  we  expect,  Satan  also),  are  to  be 


THE  "NORTH  STAR."  161 


here  on  Saturday  next,  and  open  at  7  o'clock  in  the 
evening  in  their  big  tent,  and  continue  their  haran 
gues  over  the  Sabbath.  This  trio  have  made  sale  for 
a  great  many  unmerchantable  eggs  in  other  places." 
Their  meetings  on  Sunday  were  so  crowded  that 
they  had  to  go  out  from  the  church  into  the  grove. 
Neither  the  big  tent  nor  the  eggs  seem  to  have  been 
on  hand  ;  but  on  Monday  Garrison  was  attacked  by  a, 
fever,  which  kept  'him  prostrate  for  five  weeks; 
while  Douglass  and  Foster  went  .on  to  a  series  of  con 
ventions  which  began  at  Buffalo,  September  14,  and 
closed  with  the  month  at  Albany,  after  taking  in 
Rochester  and  Syracuse. 

The  publication  of  the  "  North  Star "  was  now 
announced,  under  circumstances  which  it  is  my  duty 
to  try  to  present  in  a  different  light  from  that  thrown 
upon  them  in  the  really  noble  work  above  quoted.  It 
must  be  remembered  that  Garrison  had  been  con 
sulted  when  the  project  was  first  entertained,  and  had 
spoken  of  it  editorially  in  a  way  likely  to  hinder  it 
from  succeeding.  I  do  not  think  that  Douglass  was 
under  any  obligation  to  consult  him  again,  especi 
ally  as  this  was  not  even  suggested  by  the  givers  of 
the  five  hundred  pounds.  This  money,  as  stated  in  an 
article  published  in  London,  July  24,  and  reprinted 
two  months  later  by  the  "  Liberator,"  was  sent  on  the 
express  understanding  that  Douglass  might,  if  he  had 
no  immediate  use  for  it,  have  it  invested  "  under 
trustees  of  his  own  choosing,"  for  his  own  permanent 
benefit  and  that  of  his  children  ;  but  that  "  If  at  any 
future  time  he  should  consider  it  advisable  to  estab 
lish  a  newspaper  of  his  own,  the  capital  so  invested 
shall  be  available  for  that  purpose."  He  was  the 


I  62  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

only  man  in  America  who  had  any  right  to  decide 
what  should  be  done  with  this  gift.  Of  course,  he 
was  under  great  obligations  for  what  Garrison  had 
done  for  him  individually,  as  well  as  for  his  race. 
But  we  must  not  forget  that  he  had  made  some  return 
in  the  praises  given  to  the  "  Liberator  "  and  its  editor 
in  a  widely  circulated  book,  and  in  speeches  applauded 
by  great  multitudes.  Garrison  would  undoubtedly 
have  said,  "  If  you  owe  anything  to  me,  pay  it  to  our 
cause."  That  cause  had  no  more  faithful  servant 
than  the  man  who  risked  his  life  at  Pendleton  and 
Manayunk;  who  labored  so  diligently  as  repeatedly  to 
exhaust  his  mighty  strength  ;  who  spent  year  after 
year,  without  complaint,  in  journeys  which  seldom 
allowed  him  to  be  with  his  family  ;  who  deliberately 
exposed  himself  to  be  sent  back  into  slavery,  in  its 
most  cruel  form,  rather  than  keep  back  facts  which 
might  help  on  the  work  ;  who  had  come  back  to 
danger,  ignominy,  and  privations  in  America,  instead 
of  remaining  abroad  with  his  family  in  luxury, 
safety,  and  honor  ;  and  who  now  chose  to  put  his 
entire  fortune  into  an  enterprise  of  doubtful  prospects, 
but  of  possible  benefit  to  his  race,  rather  than  lay  it 
aside  for  his  permanent  comfort  and  that  of  his 
children.  Douglass  had  now  paid  all  his  debts  to 
Garrison  ;  and  there  was  a  large  balance  due  him  on 
the  other  side. 

He  still  considered  himself  pledged  to  devote  the 
money  to  the  purpose  for  which  it  was  originally 
subscribed,  as  soon  as  he  could  find  a  favorable 
opening.  He  declined  a  place  on  the  "  Liberator," 
for  this  would  not  have  been  what  was  designed  by 
the  donors.  In  August  we  find  him  almost  decided 


THE  "NORTH  STAR."  163 

to  become  an  associate  editor  of  the  "  Ram's  Horn," 
and  write  regularly  for  the  "  Standard,"  both  which 
journals  were  published  in  New  York  City.  On 
October  i,  however,  the  "  Liberator "  announced 
that  he  was  about  to  publish  a  new  paper  at  Cleveland, 
called  the  "  North  Star."  This  notice  was  probably 
given  in  consequence  of  a  letter  which  he  wrote  after 
September  12,  the  day  when  Garrison  was  taken  sick. 
At  all  events,  Douglass  had  at  that  time  been  only 
thirty-six  hours  in  the  city  ;  and  his  new  scheme  can 
scarcely  have  been  sufficiently  matured  to  make  it 
necessary  to  say  much  about  it.  There  would  have 
been  very  little  to  complain  of,  if  Garrison  had,  as  he 
said,  heard  nothing  about  it  before  his  illness  ;  but  it 
is  altogether  probable  that  the  violence  of  the  attack 
caused  him  to  forget  what  had  been  told  him  just 
before  his  sickness  by  Douglass,  according  to  a  state 
ment  made  by  the  latter  that  winter. 

The  reader  is  now  requested  to  compare  carefully 
two  letters.  Rev.  S.  J.  May  wrote  to  Garrison,  on 
October  8,  from  Western  New  York,  that 

"  Frederick  Douglass  was  very  much  troubled  that  he  did 
not  get  any  tidings  from  you  when  he  reached  Syracuse  on  the 
24th  of  September.  He  left  you  reluctantly,  yet  thinking  that 
you  would  follow  on  in  a  day  or  two  ;  and  as  he  did  not  get 
any  .word  from  you  at  Waterloo,  nor  at  Auburn,  he  was  almost 
sure  he  should  meet  you  at  my  house.  His  countenance  fell, 
and  his  heart  failed  him,  when  he  found  me  likewise  in  sad 
suspense  about  you.  Not  until  he  arrived  at  West  Winfield 
did  he  get  any  relief,  and  then  through  the  '  Liberator '  of 
the  23d."  ^ 

This  letter  had,  I  fear,  been  read  by  Garrison,  when 


164  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

he  wrote,  twelve   days  later,  from  Cleveland,  which 
he  had  not  quitted,  to  his  wife  thus  : 

"  Is  it  not  strange  that  Douglass  has  not  written  a  single 
line  to  me,  or  to  any  one  in  this  place,  inquiring  after  my  health, 
since  he  left  me  on  a  bed  of  illness  ?  It  will  also  greatly 
surprise  our  friends  in  Boston  to  hear  that,  in  regard  to  his 
project  for  establishing  a  paper  here,  to  be  called  the  '  North 
Star  '  ...  he  never  opened  to  me  his  lips  on  the  subject,  nor 
asked  my  advice  in  any  particular  whatever  !  Such  conduct 
grieves  me  to  the  heart.  His  conduct  about  the  paper  has 
been  impulsive,  inconsiderate,  and  highly  inconsistent  with  his 
decision  in  Boston.  What  will  his  English  friends  say  of  such 
a  strange  somerset  ?  I  am  sorry  that  friend  Quincy  did  not 
express  himself  more  strongly  against  this  project  in  the 
'  Liberator.'  It  is  a  delicate  matter,  I  know,  but  it  must  be 
met  with  firmness." 

We  must  remember  that  Douglass  had  at  first  given 
up  his  own  wishes  in  deference  to  Garrison's  advice, 
and  had  spent  months  in  deliberation  before  he 
finally  decided  to  use  money  which  had  been  put 
entirely  at  his  own  disposal,  in  the  way  originally 
selected  by  the  givers.  Was  this  "  impulsive  "  or 
"  inconsiderate  ? "  And  what  need  was  there  for 
"  firmness,"  or  for  a  single  word  against  the  publica 
tion  from  Mr.  Quincy,  who  was  temporarily  editing 
the  "  Liberator  ?  "  The  "  North  Star  "  was  soon  to 
appear,  and  the  only  question  was  whether  it  should 
be  a  success  or  a  failure.  Is  it  necessary  to  say  which 
result  would  have  been  for  the  good  of  the  cause  ? 
Did  Douglass  deserve  nothing  but  opposition  in  his 
new  career?  A  dozen  friendly  words  might  have 
brought  him  a  thousand  subscribers.  It  is  sad  not 
to  find  them  in  the  early  numbers  of  the  "  North 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR."  165 

Star,"  nor  in  the  long  editorial  which  Garrison  wrote, 
as  he  resumed  his  charge  of  the  "  Liberator,"  on 
January  7,  1848.  A  week  later  he  reprinted,  without 
comment,  the  statement  of  Mrs.  Chapman  that  a 
subscription  list  for  the  "  North  Star  "  had  been  hung 
up  in  the  Anti-Slavery  Bazaar  at  Boston.  She  also 
expressed  her  hopes  for  the  new  editor  thus  : 

"  Let  him  be,  as  heretofore,  proof  against  every  form  of 
temptation,  and  a  long  and  glorious  career,  like  that  of  Clarkson 
(whose  past  is  already  sealed)  and  Garrison  (whom  God 
preserve  to  a  like  late  and  faithful  ending)  lies  before  him. 
More  fortunately  circumstanced  than  Toussaint,"  ..."  may 
his  success  be  made  proportionate  to  his  ability  by  his  devoted- 
ness  and  perseverance  to  the  end." 

But  it  was  not  until  January  28  that  the  "  Liber 
ator  "  acknowledged  that 

"  The  facility  with  which  Mr.  Douglass  has  adapted  himself 
to  his  new  and  responsible  position,  is  another  proof  of  his 
genius,  and  worthy  of  especial  praise.  His  editorial  articles 
are  exceedingly  well  written  ;  and  the  typographical,  ortho 
graphical,  and  grammatical  accuracy,  with  which  the  "  North 
Star"  is  printed,  surpasses  that  of  any  other  paper  ever 
published  by  a  colored  man." 

He  had  already  made  up  his  mind  that  Western 
New  York,  where  he  had  often  spoken  acceptably, 
would  give  him  an  even  better  field  than  Ohio  ;  and 
thus,  as  he  says  himself  in  "Life  and  Times"  (p.  295), 
"  From  motives  of  peace,  instead  of  issuing  my  paper 
in  Boston,  among  New  England  friends,  I  went  to 
Rochester,  New  York,  among  strangers."  This  last 
word  is  amply  justified  by  Miss  Holley's  letter,  which 
will  be  found  in  another  chapter.  The  first  number 


I  66  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

of  the  "  North  Star  "  appeared  accordingly  at  Roch 
ester,  on  December  3,  1847.  Mr.  Delany,  who  had 
edited  the  "  Mystery,"  and  who  was  not  prevented  by 
the  complete  blackness  of  his  skin  from  afterwards 
becoming  a  major  in  our  army,  was  associated  with 
Douglass  ;  and  there  were  agents  in  Pennsylvania, 
Ohio,  and  Michigan,  as  well  as  in  New  England.  The 
first  article  is  an  account  of  the  convention  of  colored 
people  which  opened  October  6,  at  Troy,  where 
Douglass  exhorted  them  to  come  out  of  the  pro- 
slavery  churches,  and  said,  that  "  His  right  arm  should 
wither  before  he  would  worship  at  their  blood-stained 
altars."  The  next  number,  four  weeks  later,  con 
tains  cordial  notices  from  the  Rochester  dailies,  the 
"  New  York  Tribune,"  the  "  Standard,"  and  the  "Anti- 
Slavery  Bugle,"  whose  editor  had  warmly  encouraged 
the  plan  of  the  new  paper,  and  would  have  merged 
his  own  sheet  in  it  if  it  had  been  published  at  Cleve 
land.  The  "  Liberator  "  was  still  under  the  charge 
of  Mr.  Ouincy,  who  had  promptly  acknowledged  his 
friend's  "eminent  ability  to  man  any  breach  that 
calls  for  a  ready  mind  and  a  strong  arm,"  and  who 
now  said  that  the  "  North  Star's  "  "  literary  and  me 
chanical  execution  would  do  honor  to  any  paper,  new 
or  old,  anti-slavery  or  pro-slavery,  in  the  country." 
It  was  certainly  a  much  more  interesting  paper,  for 
general  readers,  than  the  "  Liberator,"  whose  sub 
scribers  must  have  been  largely  actuated  by  a  sense 
of  duty.  There  were  not  so  many  long  contributions 
about  visionary  schemes  ;  and  there  was  a  great 
abundance  of  selections  from  the  brightest  and  ablest 
authors  of  the  day,  like  Parker,  Longfellow,  Sumner, 
Douglas  Jerrold,  Dickens,  Thackeray,  Macaulay, 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR."  167 

Howitt,  Emerson,  Lamartine,  and  Andersen.  In  fact, 
the  main  difficulty  I  found,  in  looking  over  the  "North 
Star,"  was  the  constant  temptation  to  linger  over 
interesting  extracts.  To  a  poor  family/  who  had  little 
reading  matter  besides,  its  arrival  must  have  been  the 
great  event  of  the  week,  especially  as  there  were  many 
valuable  suggestions  on  practical  points,  while  ample 
notice  was  taken  of  all  important  events,  for  instance 
the  dethronement  of  Louis  Philippe.  Its  chief  editor 
had  the  advantage  of  a  great  gift,  which  he  had  already 
shown  on  the  platform,  and  which  is  manifest  on 
every  page  of  his  books,  that  of  always  knowing  how 
to  interest  people.  Even  his  boldest  utterances  were 
made  attractive.  Publishing  this  paper  was,  to  quote 
his  own  words  to  me,  "  almost  the  wrisest  thing  I  ever 
did."  He  had  to  keep  hard  at  work  reading  and 
thinking,  collecting  new  matter  and  revising  his  old 
views.  He  was  still  a  staunch  disunionist  ;  and  the 
Harrisburg  riot  had  been  praised  by  a  Pennsylvania 
newspaper,  which  declared  that  "  Douglass  is  a  darkey 
and  a  tool  for  the  enemies  of  our  country."  ..."  He 
lets  no  opportunity  pass  without  giving  our  country 
a  stab.  It  is  unnecessary  to  say  that  he  also  stabs 
Democrats  at  every  corner,  and  is  armed  to  the  shirt- 
collar  with  treason."  He  was  now  in  the  region  where 
the  Liberty  party  had  its  main  strength  ;  and  the 
necessity  of  meeting  its  arguments  led  him  to  test 
repeatedly  the  strength  of  his  own  position.  He  was 
as  firm  in  it,  however,  in  1848,  as  ever  before. 

He  had  scarcely  started  the  "  North  Star,"  when  he 
made  a  long  journey  as  a  lecturer,  speaking  in  Janu 
ary  at  the  Bazaar  in  Boston,  in  April  at  various  points 
in  Ohio,  and  on  May  9  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the 


l6S  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

A.  A.  S.  S.  in  the  Broadway  Tabernacle,  in  New  York 
City.  Before  copying  the  account  of  his  speech,  writ 
ten  down  that  day  on  the  platform  by  Henry  C. 
Wright,  one  of  an  audience  of  nearly  three  thousand, 
I  must  give  a  word  or  two  of  explanation.  John  P. 
Hale,  who  had  but  just  before  been  nominated  for 
the  Presidency  by  the  Liberty  party,  had  lost  his 
election  as  a  member  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
because  he  opposed  the  annexation  of  Texas,  but  had 
recently  been  chosen  Senator.  Soon  after  he  took  his 
seat  in  Washington  an  attempt  was  made  to  rescue 
seventy-live  slaves,  among  whom  were  three  young 
girls  of  remarkable  beauty.  The  vessel  in  which  they 
fled  was  brought  back ;  and  popular  indignation 
against  the  captain  was  expressed  in  a  shameful  riot. 
This  disorder  gave  Hale  a  good  opportunity  for  be 
ginning  an  attack  upon  the  whole  system  of  slavery. 
His  colleagues  were  too  angry,  however,  to  let  him  do 
more  than  begin  ;  and  his  purpose  was  not  under 
stood  by  the  Abolitionists.  Such  was  the  state  of 
things  when,  according  to  Wright's  letter, 

"  Frederick  Douglass  now  takes  the  platform,  and  is 
welcomed  with  applause.  The  assembly  is  now  fixed  in  its 
close  attention,  and  Frederick  is  going  on  to  show  up  the 
cowardly  and  sneaking  conduct  of  John  P.  Hale,  in  bringing  in 
a  bill  to  protect  property,  and  not  daring  to  stand  up  and  fear 
lessly  advocate  the  right  of  slaves  to  run  away,  and  the  right 
and  duty  of  Abolitionists  to  protect  them.  Frederick  is  describ 
ing  '  Punch's  '  portraits  of  Brother  Jonathan,  with  the  devil 
hovering  over  him,  eying  with  satisfaction  passing  events.  The 
audience  give  him  great  applause.  He  is  speaking  to  great 
effect,  portraying  the  wrongs  of  the  colored  population  of  this 
nation.  His  eloquence  sways  the  great  assembly  with  him. 
He  denounces  the  Northerners,  who  swear  to  support  the 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR."  169 

Constitution,  as  the  real  slave-holders  of  the  country.  It  is 
good  to  listen  to  him.  He  shows  up  the  Northern  apologists 
of  slavery  as  those  whose  smiles  he  does  not  want.  He 
pledges  himself  to  denounce  those  enemies  of  God  and  man, 
who  swear  to  support  the  Constitution,  as  his  enemies. 
Frederick  has  got  the  audience  into  a  great  state  of  glorifica 
tion  ;  and  he  is  now  showing  that  there  is  no  way  to  abolish 
slavery  except  by  the  dissolution  of  the  Union.  There,  he  is 
done  ;  and  the  meeting  is  breaking  up.  It  has  been  a  pleasant 
and  profitable  time." 

Douglass  now  enlarged  his  aims  so  far  as  to  include 
a  new  reform,  even  more  unpopular  than  abolitionism. 
Women  were  then  excluded,  throughout  the  United 
States,  not  only  from  the  suffrage,  but  from  almost 
every  lucrative  or  honorable  employment,  while  their 
pay,  in  such  occupations  as  were  left  open  to  them, 
was  but  scanty.  They  had  scarcely  any  opportunity 
to  get  a  thorough  education,  and  their  attempts  at 
public  speaking  met  with  violent  opposition,  as  we 
have  seen  to  have  been  the  case  with  Abby  Kelley 
and  Angelina  Grimke.  A  married  woman  could  own 
nothing,  not  even  her  daily  earnings  or  her  clothes  ; 
and  her  husband  or  father  might  take  away  her 
children.  Efforts  had  been  made  from  time  to  time, 
by  Frances  Wright,  the  Grimke  sisters,  Ernestine  L. 
Rose,  and  other  women  individually,  to  right  these 
wrongs,  but  there  was  no  concerted  movement  before 
1848.  Then  a  "  Woman's  Rights  Convention  "  met,  on 
July  19,  at  Seneca  Falls,  on  a  call  sent  out  by 
Lucretia  Mott,  Elizabeth  Cady  Stanton,  and  two  other 
ladies.  A  declaration  of  independence,  closely  copied 
from  that  adopted  in  1776,  was  signed  by  a  hundred 
men  and  women,  and  among  the  names  is  that  of 


170  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

Frederick  Douglass.  He  took  part  with  Mrs.  Stanton 
in  a  proceeding  which  she  described,  on  March  31, 
1888,  before  the  International  Council  of  Women  at 
Washington,  as  follows  : 

"  I  wanted  to  demand  the  right  of  suffrage  then  and  there, 
because  I  saw  that  was  the  fundamental  right  out  of  which  all 
ethers  would  necessarily  flow,  so  I  drew  up,  myself,  a  very 
short  resolution,  and  my  husband  told  me,  '  Now,  you  make  the 
whole  thing  ridiculous.  So  long  as  you  advocate  simply  rights 
of  education,  rights  of 'property,  rights  of  children,  and  all  that 
sort  of  thing,  it  is  very  well,  but  the  idea  of  demanding  the 
right  of  suffrage ! '  And  Lucretia  Mott  said  the  same  thing, 
and  all  the  convention  ;  those  who  were  interested  in  it  were 
opposed  to  this  resolution.  So  I  seemingly  gave  it  up,  but 
when  I  got  into  the  convention  I  determined  to  push  forward 
my  resolution ;  but,  unfortunately,  I  had  never  said  a  word  in 
public,  and  how  to  put  two  sentences  together  I  did  not  know. 
So  I  surveyed  the  convention,  and  there  I  saw  one  man, 
Frederick  Douglass,  and  I  knew  that  Frederick,  from  personal 
experience,  was  just  the  man  for  the  work  ;  so  I  read  my  reso 
lution,  and  then  I  hurried  to  his  side,  and  whispered  into  his 
ear  what  I  wanted  said  ;  and  he  went  along  awhile  very  well, 
but  he  didn't  speak  quite  fast  enough  for  me,  nor  say  all  I 
wanted  said ;  and  the  first  thing  I  knew  I  was  on  my  feet 
making  a  speech  for  that  resolution,  and  Frederick  Douglass 
and  I  carried  the  whole  convention,  and  the  resolution  was 
passed  unanimously." 

Another  of  the  speakers  on  this  fortieth  anniver 
sary  of  the  reform,  said,  in  reply  : 

"  There  are  few  facts  in  my  humble  history  to  which  I  look 
back  with  more  satisfaction  than  to  the  fact,  recorded  in  the 
history  of  the  Woman  Suffrage  Movement,  that  I  was  sufficiently 
enlightened  at  that  early  day,  and  when  only  a  few  years  from 
slavery,  to  support  your  resolution  for  woman  suffrage.  I  have 
done  very  little  in  this  world  in  which  to  glory,  except  this  one 


THE  "NORTH  STAR.'  171 

act — and  I  certainly  glory  in  that.  When  I  ran  away  from 
slavery,  it  was  for  myself ;  when  I  advocated  emancipation,  it 
was  for  my  people ;  but  when  I  stood  up  for  the  rights  of 
woman,  self  was  out  of  the  question,  and  I  found  a  little 
nobility  in  the  act." 

Scarcely  was  the  convention  of  1848  finished,  when 
he  wrote  an  editorial,  ending  thus  : 

"  Standing  as  we  do  upon  the  watch-tower  of  human  freedom, 
we  cannot  be  deterred  from  an  expression  of  our  approbation 
of  any  movement,  however  humble,  to  improve  and  elevate  the 
character  of  any  members  of  the  human  family.  While  it  is 
impossible  for  us  to  go  into  this  subject  at  length,  and  dispose 
of  the  various  objections  which  are  often  urged  against  such  a 
doctrine  as  that  of  female  equality,  we  are  free  to  say  that  in 
respect  to  political  rights,  we  hold  woman  to  be  justly  entitled 
to  all  we  claim  for  man.  We  go  further,  and  express  our 
conviction  that  all  political  rights  which  it  is  expedient  for  man 
to  exercise,  it  is  equally  so  for  woman.  All  that  distinguishes 
man  as  an  intelligent  and  accountable  being,  is  equally  true  of 
woman  ;  and  if  that  government  only  is  just  which  governs  by 
the  free  consent  of  the  governed,  there  can  be  no  reason  in  the 
world  for  denying  to  woman  the  exercise  of  the  elective  fran 
chise,  or  a  hand  in  making  and  administering  the  laws  of  the 
land.  Our  doctrine  is  that  '  Right  is  of  no  sex.'  We,  therefore, 
bid  the  women  engaged  in  this  movement  our  humble  God 
speed." 

The  Seneca  Falls  convention  had  adjourned  on 
July  20,  to  reassemble  on  August  2,  in  Rochester; 
and  there  we  find  the  editor  of  the  "  North  Star " 
advocating  "  the  emancipation  of  women  from  all  the 
artificial  disabilities  imposed  by  false  customs,  creeds, 
and  codes."  We  also  read  that  "  In  answer  to  the 
many  objections  made  by  gentlemen  present  to  grant 
ing  to  women  the  rights  of  suffrage,  Frederick 
Douglass  replied  in  a  long,  argumentative,  and 


172  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

eloquent  appeal  for  the  complete  equality  of  women 
in  all  the  rights  that  belong  to  any  human  soul.  He 
thought  the  true  basis  of  rights  was  the  capacity  of 
individuals  ;  and  as  for  himself,  he  should  not  dare 
claim  a  right  that  he  would  not  concede  to  women." 
One  active  worker  in  the  cause  wTrote  soon  after  to 
another,  "  Can  you  tell  me  of  any  paper  that  advocates 
our  claims  more  warmly  than  the  '  North  Star  ? ' ' 
("  History  of  Woman  Suffrage."  Vol.  i,  pp.  67-91, 
802-810.) 

One  week  later  he  was  present  at  a  convention, 
with  whose  objects  he  had  not  full  sympathy. 
Many  of  our  best  and  ablest  men  had  supposed  that 
they  could  do  better  work  against  slavery  by  remain 
ing  Whigs  or  Democrats,  than  by  becoming  either 
Garrisonians  or  members  of  the  Liberty  party,  which 
latter  broke  up  in  1847  into  two  factions  with  differ 
ent  candidates  for  the  Presidency.  Thus,  the  anti- 
slavery  champions  were  scattered  about  in  five  hostile 
camps.  Four  of  these  detachments  united  in  1848  to 
form  the  Free  Soil  party.  Early  in  that  year,  Lewis 
Cass,  who  had  declared  himself  opposed  to  that 
attempt  to  check  the  extension  of  slavery,  known  as 
the  Wilmot  Proviso,  was  nominated  on  a  pro-slavery 
platform  by  the  Democratic  party,  which  had  taken 
the  lead  in  annexing  Texas,  as  well  as  in  making  war 
on  Mexico,  and  which  was  now  determined  to  carry 
slavery  into  new  territory.  The  anti-slavery  Demo 
crats  of  New  York,  nicknamed  "  Barnburners,"  on 
account  of  their  desire  to  reform  the  civil  service, 
were  so  badly  treated  in  the  nominating  convention 
that  they  withdrew  in  disgust,  and  recommended  for 
President  Martin  Van  Buren,  who  had  been  elected 


THE  "NORTH  STAR."  173 

by  the  Democrats  in  1836,  had  been  re-nominated  in 
1840,  but  not  elected,  and  would  have  been  chosen  as 
the  party  candidate  in  1844,  if  he  had  been  sufficiently 
in  favor  of  annexation  and  war.  Mean  time,  General 
Taylor,  a  slave-holder  who  had  never  cast  a  vote  or 
held  any  civil  office,  and  who  had  no  scruples  about 
taking  a  nomination  from  anybody,  was  put  up, 
merely  to  catch  votes,  by  the  Whigs,  who  refused  to 
frame  any  platform,  and  voted  down  resolution  after 
resolution  against  the  extension  of  slavery.  Taylor's 
position  was  described  in  the  "  Biglow  Papers"  as 
"  frontin'  South  by  North,"  and  his  letters  were 
parodied  thus  : 

"  Ez  to  my  princerples,  I  glory 

In  hevin'  nothin'  o'  the  sort ; 
I  ain't  a  Wig ;  I  ain't  a  Tory  ; 

I'm  jest  a  candidate  in  short. 
Thet's  fair  an'  square  an'  parpendicler ; 

But  if  the  public  cares  a  fig 
To  hev  me  an'thin'  in  particler, 

Wy,  I'm  a  kind  o'  periwig." 

Foremost  among  those  members  of  the  Whig  con 
vention,  who  had  protested  against  the  retirement  of 
the  party  into  neutrality  about  all  political  questions, 
was  Henry  Wilson  ;  and  he  now  took  the  lead  in  a 
movement  for  cooperating  with  the  Barnburners  in 
forming  a  new  party.  A  convention  to  meet  for  this 
purpose,  in  Buffalo,  early  in  August,  was  planned  ; 
and  the  suggestion  was  accepted  by  a  mass-meeting 
of  citizens  of  Ohio  of  all  parties  opposed  to  the 
extension  of  slavery,  which  met  in  Columbus  at  the 
same  time  that  Van  Buren  was  nominated  by  the 
Barnburners.  The  plan  was  also  indorsed  by  a  con- 


174  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

vention  of  the  Liberty  party  at  Columbus,  with  Sal 
mon  P.  Chase  in  the  chair.  A  fourth  convention, 
that  same  month,  June,  1848,  was  held,  in  opposition 
to  the  extension  of  slavery,  at  Worcester,  where 
speeches  were  made  by  Sumner,  Giddings,  and 
Charles  Francis  Adams,  and  delegates  from  each  of 
the  three  parties  were  appointed  for  Buffalo.  Daniel 
Webster  was  at  first  inclined  to  favor  the  movement  ; 
and  it  had  the  steady  support  in  New  York  of  Bryant, 
Dix,  and  Tilden. 

When  the  convention  met  at  Buffalo,  on  August  9, 
Frederick  Douglass  was  present  as  a  spectator  ;  and 
the  mention  of  his  name  was  received  with  loud 
cheers  ;  but  he  declined  the  invitation  to  speak.  He 
was  still  too  much  of  a  disunionist  to  join  any  party; 
and  he  was  soon  confirmed  in  this  position  by  the 
platform  as  well  as  by  the  nomination  for  the  Presi 
dency.  It  was  proposed  to  prohibit  slavery  in  all 
free  territory,  to  make  no  more  compromises  with  its 
supporters,  and  to  relieve  the  general  government  of 
all  responsibility  for  its  continuance  ;  but  at  the  same 
time  it  was  recognized  as  a  State  institution,  which 
should  not  be  interfered  with  by  Congress  ;  and 
Van  Buren  had  made  so  many  concessions  to  the 
South,  that  it  was  a  great  mistake  to  prefer  him 
to  Hale  at  Buffalo.  He  received  five  times  as 
man)'-  votes  as  the  candidate  of  the  Liberty  party 
had  done  four  years  before  ;  and  the  agitation  soon 
carried  Chase,  Seward,  and  Sumner  into  the  Senate  ; 
but  the  Garrisonians  held,  with  the  "  North  Star," 
"  That  the  Free  Soil  movement  ought  not  to  be  con 
sidered  as  the  real  anti-slavery  movement  of  the 
country."  It  was  looked  upon  more  favorably  than 


THE  "NORTH  STAR."  175 

the  Liberty  party  had  ever  been  ;  but  the  feeling 
about  Van  Buren  among  Abolitionists  was  what 
Lowell  expresses  thus  : 

"  I  swan,  I'm  clean  disgusted. 

He  ain't  the  man  that  I  can  say,  is  fittin'  to  be  trusted ; 
He  ain't  half  anti-slav'ry  'nough ;  nor  I  ain't  sure,  as  some  be, 
He'd  go  in  fer  abolishin'  the  Deestrict  o'  Columby. 

******* 
An'  then,  another  thing,  I  guess,  though  mebby  I  am  wrong, 
This  Buff'lo  plaster  ain't  a  goin'  to  dror  almighty  strong." 

A  resolution,  indorsing  the  new  party,  was  passed 
in  the  colored  people's  convention,  which  met  early 
that  September  at  Cleveland  ;  but  the  president,  Mr. 
Douglass,  had  his  dissent  recorded  formally.  He 
succeeded  in  carrying  an  amendment,  by  which  women 
were  made  members  ;  and  there  was  no  opposition  to 
the  address,  drawn  up  by  him,  and  saying,  "We  ask 
that  the  doors  of  the  school-house,  the  workshop,  the 
church,  the  college  shall  be  thrown  open  as  freely  to 
our  children  as  to  the  children  of  other  members  of 
the  community."  His  speech  presented  what  is  still 
an  advanced  idea  of  education,  thus  : 

"  Try  to  get  your  sons  into  mechanical  trades.  Press  them 
into  the  blacksmiths'  shops,  the  machine  shop,  the  joiner's 
shop,  the  wheelwright's  shop,  the  cooper's  shop,  and  the 
tailor's  shop."  .  .  .  .  "  Every  blow  of  the  sledge  hammer, 
wielde'd  by  a  sable  arm,  is  a  powerful  blow  in  support  of  our 
cause.  Every  colored  mechanic  is,  by  virtue  of  circumstance, 
an  elevator  of  his  race.  Every  house  built  by  black  men  is  a 
strong  tower  against  the  allied  hosts  of  prejudice.  It  is 
impossible  for  us  to  attach  too  much  importance  to  this  aspect 
of  the  subject.  Trades  are  important.  Wherever  a  man  may 
he  thrown  by  misfortune,  if  he  has  in  his  hands  a  useful  trade, 
he  is  useful  to  his  fellow-man,  and  will  be  esteemed  accord- 


176  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

ingly.     And  of  all  men  in  the  world  who  need  trades,  we  are 
the  most  needy." 

While  traveling,  in  consequence  of  this  convention, 
on  one  of  the  steamers  which  ran  between  Cleveland 
and  Buffalo,  he  gave  a  lecture  at  the  invitation  of 
some  of  the  other  passengers.  He  closed  by  saying, 
that  he  should  be  happy  to  hear  from  any  slave 
holder  in  reply  ;  and  he  may  possibly  have  mentioned 
that  there  was  one  already  trying  to  apologize  for  his 
position  in  the  "North  Star."  One  of  the  audience 
told  him  indignantly,  that  no  white  man  would  con 
descend  to  argue  with  a  nigger.  "  My  dear  father  was 
as  white  as  you  are,"  rejoined  Douglass.  "  If  you 
cannot  condescend  to  argue  with  my  negro  blood, 
please  reply  to  the  European  blood." 

On  returning  home,  he  found  that  the  color- 
prejudice  had  shown  itself  in  a  peculiarly  base  and 
cruel  form.  His  family  had  followed  him  to  Roch 
ester  ;  and  his  daughter,  Rosetta,  then  nine  years  old, 
had  been  accepted  as  a  pupil  in  a  private  school,  kept 
by  a  Christian  lady  and  near  his  house,  which  was 
on  high  ground  not  far  from  Mount  Hope  cemetery. 
He  was  happy  in  the  thought,  that  his  child  was 
having  advantages  which  he  had  lost.  The  little 
girl  did  not  seem  happy,  however ;  and  he  soon 
found  that  she  was  kept  in  a  room  by  herself,  a 
prisoner  on  account  of  her  color,  not  permitted  to 
see  or  hear  any  of  the  other  pupils,  but  obliged  to 
recite  and  take  a  recess  by  herself.  He  complained 
to  the  teacher  of  this  cruel  fraud,  but  was  told  that 
it  was  necessary  for  the  good  of  the  school.  He  in 
sisted  that  the  other  girls  should  be  asked,  whether 
they  had  any  objection  to  his  daughter's  company  ; 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR.  177 

and  it  was  found  that  none  of  them  had  yet  been 
contaminated  by  the  popular  prejudice.  The  teacher 
now  declared  that  she  could  not  let  Rosa  be  with 
them,  unless  all  their  parents  were  satisfied  ;  and 
strong  objection  was  made  by  one  of  the  fathers, 
whose  house  stood  next  to  that  of  Douglass.  After 
this  he  had  to  have  his  children  taught  at  home  by  a 
governess  from  England.  There  was  no  other  school 
open  to  them,  except  a  very  poor  one  kept  up  for 
colored  people  only  at  the  other  side  of  the  city  ;  and 
the  boys  were  even  younger  than  the  girl.  That 
winter,  however,  he  took  the  lead  in  an  agitation 
which  did  not  cease  until  all  children  were  permitted 
to  enter  the  Rochester  schools  without  distinction  of 
color,  a  reform  not  yet  accomplished  at  Washington. 
He  also  opposed  all  restrictions  at  theaters,  lecture- 
rooms,  and  other  public  places  ;  and  colored  travelers 
soon  told  him,  that  they  felt  the  influence  of  his  paper 
within  a  radius  of  fifty  miles. 

On  the  Friday  after  the  slave-holder  without  opin 
ions  was  elected  President,  it  was  declared  in  the 
"North  Star"  that  "The  cry  of  disunion  shall  be 
more  fearlessly  proclaimed  till  slavery  be  abolished, 
the  Union  dissolved,  or  the  sun  of  this  guilty  nation 
go  down  in  blood."  At  the  meeting  of  the  A.  A.  S.  S. 
in  New  York  city,  an  address  was  made  on  Wednes 
day  evening,  May  9,  1849,  °v  Douglass,  who 
condemned  the  project  of  circulating  tracts  and  the 
Bible  amongst  the  slaves.  "  Give  them  freedom 
first,"  he  said,  "  and  then  they  will  find  the  Bible  for 
themselves.  The  owners  of  slaves  dread  nothing 
more  than  that  any  of  their  slaves  should  learn  to 
read.  That  instant  he  feels  the  fetters  that  bind 


178  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

him."  He  then  "  went  on  to  censure  the  religionists, 
who  conferred  honors  on  the  spillers  of  blood  ;  for 
instance,  on  Zachary  Taylor,  who  sent  the  hound  on 
the  track  of  the  Indian." 

The  "  North  Star  "  had  not  met  with  so  warm  a 
welcome  from  the  Garrisonians  as  from  men  who 
were  trying,  like  Gerrit  Smith,  Horace  Mann,  Chase, 
Sumner,  Seward,  Giddings,  and  Palfrey,  to  turn  the 
whole  force  of  the  Constitution  against  slavery.  The 
necessity  of  defending  his  position  against  the  argu 
ments  of  his  new  friends  forced  Douglass  to  look 
beyond  the  narrow  limits  of  Garrisonian  orthodoxy. 
Even  as  early  as  February,  1849,  he  made  an  impor 
tant  concession  to  the  Free  Soilers.  He  said  in  his 
paper  that  "  On  a  close  examination  of  the  Constitu 
tion  I  am  satisfied  that,  if  strictly  construed,  accord 
ing  to  its  reading,  it  is  not  a  pro-slavery  instrument." 
He  still  held,  however,  that  "  The  original  intent  and 
meaning"  .  .  .  "makes  it  a  pro-slavery  instrument, 
such  a  one  as  I  cannot  bring  myself  to  vote  under  or 
swear  to  support."  Two  days  after  the  speech  in 
New  York  City,  just  quoted,  he  held  a  public  debate 
there  with  the  editor  of  the  "  Northern  Star  and 
Colored  Farmer,"  who,  about  this  time,  changed  the 
name  of  his  paper  to  avoid  any  confusion  with  its 
rival.  Mr.  Ward  was  a  negro  of  the  purest  blood, 
and  the  force  of  his  arguments  is  acknowledged  by 
his  mulatto  antagonist  to  have  been  so  great  as 
ultimately  to  have  made  a  permanent  conquest.  The 
conversion  was  far  from  sudden,  however,  and  we 
find  the  little  remnant  of  the  Liberty  party  persuaded 
by, Gerrit  Smith,  on  July  3,  1849,  to  resolve  unani 
mously  "  That  the  Phillipses,  and  Ouinceys,  and 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR."  '  179 

Garrisons,  and  Douglasses,  who"  .  .  .  "chime  in 
with  the  popular  cry  that  the  Constitution  is  pro- 
slavery,  do  thereby,  notwithstanding  their  anti- 
slavery  hearts,  make  themselves  practically  and 
effectively  pro-slavery." 

The  controversy  which  now  took  place  between 
the  author  of  this  resolution  and  Douglass  must  have 
stimulated  the  growth  of  the  seed  sown  by  the 
"  Colored  Farmer."  The  arguments  brought  forward 
by  the  leader  of  the  Liberty  men  had  much  to  recom 
mend  them  besides  their  intrinsic  truth.  He  had 
been  eagerly  observing  the  course  of  politics  for 
more  than  twenty  years,  and  from  an  independent 
standpoint.  He  had  been  working  busily  for  the 
slave  ever  since  1830,  siding  for  a  while  with  Garri 
son,  but  soon  leaving  him  to  organize  that  series  of 
appeals  to  the  ballot-box,  which  at  last  was  answered 
by  a  final  verdict  against  slavery.  His  vast  wealth 
was  still  freely  given  to  the  disunionists,  as  well  as  to 
colonizationists  and  laborers  in  his  own  path.  The 
temperance,  peace,  and  woman's  rights  movements 
found  him  among  their  earliest  and  most  zealous 
advocates.  His  princely  hospitality  welcomed  to  his 
board  the  illiterate  negro  missionary,  the  medium, 
the  Catholic  priest,  the  fugitive  slave,  and  the  blind 
beggar  ;  politicians  of  all  parties,  proselyters  of  all 
sects,  and  agitators  for  every  novelty.  Again  and 
again  he  gave  away  farms  so  freely  that  he  issued 
deeds  to  three  thousand  colored  people  between  1845 
and  1849,  and  then  he  began  a  fresh  series  of  presents 
of  land  to  white  men.  Soon  after  we  find  him  giving 
twelve  thousand  dollars  to  set  free  a  friend  who  had 
been  put  in  prison  for  aiding  fugitives  ;  and  he 


l8o  '  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

subscribed  ten  thousand  at  one  time  for  the  deliver 
ance  of  Kansas.  The  comparatively  small  assistance 
which  he  gave  from  time  to  time  to  the  "  North 
Star,"  would  undoubtedly  have  been  continued  if  it 
had  never  shifted  its  place  ;  and  we  know  too  much 
about  its  editor's  independence  of  character  to  admit 
that  he  could  ever  have  disguised  his  opinions  in 
order  to  get  aid  from  any  quarter.  He  was  too  able 
a  man  to  continue  long  a  disunionist,  after  he  had  a 
chance  to  see  both  sides  of  the  case  ;  but  it  is  no 
discredit  to  him,  if  he  was  strongly  influenced  by  the 
personal  worth  of  a  philanthropist  without  bitterness, 
whose  burning  zeal  for  religion  and  reform  was  never 
darkened  by  any  ambition  or  intolerance. 

The  cost  of  publishing  the  "North  Star"  was 
about  eighty  dollars  a  week,  and  the  number  of  sub 
scribers  was  so  small  that,  on  May  5,  1848,  a  call  for 
more  money  was  issued  in  its  columns.  The  editor 
had  mortgaged  his  house,  and  was  "  heavily  in  debt," 
when  his  friend,  Miss  Julia  Griffiths,  afterward  Mrs. 
Crofts,  a  lady  of  some  literary  ability  and  great 
energy,  came  over  with  her  sister  from  England. 
On  Thursday,  May  24,  1849,  these  ladies  were  with 
Mr.  Douglass,  going  down  the  Hudson  from  Albany  to 
New  York,  on  the  steamer  "  Alida,"  when  he  ventured 
to  go  with  them  to  the  dinner-table.  He  was  taken 
away  by  force  and  obliged  to  leave  the  cabin,  but 
they  followed  at  once,  and  went  on  to  New  York, 
hungry  and  indignant.  Miss  Julia's  zeal  and  busi 
ness  ability  soon  caused  the  mortgage  to  be  released, 
all  the  debts  to  be  paid,  and  the  circulation  to  rise, 
in  a  single  year,  from  two  thousand  to  four  thousand 
copies.  She  remained  for  some  years  in  Rochester, 


THE  "NORTH  STAR."  181 

where  she  became  an  active  officer  of  the  Ladies'  Anti- 
Slavery  Society,  and  edited  an  annual  called  "  Auto 
graphs  for  Freedom."  It  was,  I  presume,  in  her 
company,  that  Mr.  Douglass,  now  sole  editor,  went 
in  June  to  Niagara  Falls,  where  he  was  treated  like 
a  prince  on  one  side  of  the  river,  and  like  a  Pariah  on 
the  other.  The  color-line  seems  to  have  been  simply 
the  boundary  of  the  United  States. 

The  influence  of  the  Garrisonians  was  never  large 
enough  to  be  compared  with  that  of  the  Southern 
disunionists,  and  these  latter  excited  so  much  alarm 
in  1850  as  to  cause  Congress  to  adopt  a  compromise 
which  threatened  to  throw  open  the  territories  to 
slave-holders,  and  ensured  the  passage  of  a  new  law 
against  fugitives,  much  worse  than  that  which  had 
sent  Douglass  abroad.  Webster  had  spoken  in  behalf 
of  these  measures  on  March  7,  and  had  won  great 
applause  at  the  North,  especially  from  merchants 
who  wished  to  please  Southern  customers,  and  manu 
facturers  who  hoped  to  gain  Southern  votes  for  a 
return  to  the  high  duties  which  had  faeen  given  up  in 
1846.  The  leaders  of  both  of  the  great  parties  were 
bidding  against  each  other,  at  the  expense  of  the 
slaves,  for  the  support  of  the  slave-holder.  Thus  the 
political  and  business  influences  were  so  strongly  on 
the  side  of  slavery  as  to  give  it  almost  complete  con 
trol  of  both  the  press  and  the  pulpit.  One  sign  that 
public  opinion  condemned  the  Abolitionists  was  the 
license  given  to  the  rioters  against  them  in  New  York 
City.  Leading  newspapers  announced  the  annual 
meeting  of  the  A.  A.  S.  S.  in  language  intended  to 
collect  a  mob.  On  the  first  morning,  that  of  May  7, 
but  very  few  colored  people  were  present,  and  they 


I  82  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

took  care  to  keep  near  the  doors.  In  one  of  the 
front  seats  on  the  platform,  however,  sat  Frederick 
Douglass,  "  with  brows  knit,  fiery  eyes  looking  dag 
gers,  scorn  upon  his  thick  curled  lips,  and,  lurking 
in  his  sable,  wroe-begone  visage,  the  traces  of  malig 
nity,  disappointment,  and  despair."  Thus  speaks 
one  of  the  pro-slavery  papers,  and  another  calls  him 
"  the  master-genius  of  the  crowd."  Phillips  and 
Lucretia  Mott  were  also  on  the  platform,  and  so  was 
a  gambler  named  Rynders,  who  had  been  the  leader 
of  the  riot  against  Macready,  a  year  before,  in  Astor 
Place,  and  who  was  afterward  made  marshal  of  the 
district  by  Buchanan.  His  band  of  rowdies  was 
before  him,  waiting  for  a  signal,  which  he  gave  in 
consequence  of  an  attack  on  President  Taylor  by 
Garrison.  The  uproar  was  now  furious,  and  the 
police  were  evidently  under  orders  not  to  repress  it. 
At  last,  Rynders  was  induced,  by  the  promise  that 
one  of  his  supporters  should  be  heard  on  the  plat 
form,  to  allow  Garrison  to  conclude.  Dr.  Furness, 
whose  recollections  have  been  freely  drawn  upon  by 
those  who  would  describe  the  scene,  was  also  per 
mitted  to  speak  ;  and  then  came  a  fellow  named 
Grant,  who  tried  to  prove  that  a  negro  is  a  kind  of 
monkey.  His  own  adherents  soon  got  tired  of  hear 
ing  him,  and  then  Douglass  seized  his  opportunity. 
"  Captain  Rynders,"  said  he,  "  Do  you  think  that  I 
am  a  monkey?"  "  Oh  no,"  replied  Rynders,  "you 
are  half  a  white  man."  "  Then  I  am  half  man  and 
half  monkey  ?  "  "  Yes."  "  And  half  brother  to  Cap 
tain  Rynders  ? " 

The    whole     audience     united     in     laughter    and 
applause.     Douglass  now  had  the  floor,  and  went  on 


THE    "NORTH    STAR."  183 

to  attack  a  critic  of  Garrisonianism,  whom  he  knew 
to  be  hated  by  the  rioters  before  him,  Horace 
Greeley,  who  had  recently  said  in  his  paper  that  the 
blacks  did  nothing  for  themselves.  "  When  I  first 
came  North,"  said  Mr.  Douglass,  "I  went  to  the  most 
decided  anti-slavery  merchant  in  the  North,  and 
sought  employment  on  a  ship  he  was  building,  and 
he  told  me  that  if  he  were  to  give  me  work  every 
white  operative  would  quit  ;  and  yet  Mr.  Greeley 
finds  fault  with  us  that  we  do  not  help  ourselves." 
This  criticism  pleased  Rynders,  who  bore  that  gentle 
man  no  good  will  ;  and  he  added  a  word  to  Douglass's 
against  Greeley.  "  I  am  happy,"  said  Douglass,  "  to 
have  the  assent  of  my  half-brother  here,"  pointing  to 
Rynders,  and  convulsing  the  audience  with  laughter. 
After  this,  Rynders,  finding  how  he  was  played  with, 
took  care  to  hold  his  peace  ;  but  some  one  of  Rynders' 
company  in  the  gallery  undertook  to  interrupt  the 
speaker.  "  It's  of  no  use,"  said  Mr.  Douglass  ;  "  I've 
Captain  Rynders  here  to  back  me.  We  were  born 
here,"  he  went  on  to  say.  "  We  have  made  the 
clothes  you  wear,  and  the  sugar  that  you  put  into 
your  tea  ;  and  we  mean  to  stay  here  and  do  all  we  can 
for  you."  "  Yes,"  cried  a  voice  from  the  gallery, 
"and  you'll  cut  our  throats!"  "No,"  said  the 
speaker,  "we'll  only  cut  your  hair."  When  the 
laughter  ceased,  Mr.  Douglass  proceeded  to  say  : 
"  We  mean  to  stay  here,  and  do  all  we  can  for  every 
one,  be  he  a  man  or  be  he  a  monkey,"  accompanying 
these  last  words  with  a  wave  of  his  hand  toward 
the  quarter  whence  the  interruption  had  come.  He 
concluded  with  saying  that  he  saw  his  friend,  Samuel 
Ward,  present,  and  would  ask  him  to  step  forward. 


184  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

All  eyes  were  instantly  turned  to  the  back  of  the 
platform,  or  stage  rather,  so  dramatic  was  the  scene, 
and  there,  amidst  the  group,  stood  a  large  man,  so 
black  that,  as  Wendell  Phillips  said,  when  he  shut  his 
eyes  you  could  not  see  him.  "  Had  I  observed  him 
before,  I  should  have  wondered  what  brought  him 
here,  accounting  him  as  fresh  from  Africa."  He 
belonged  to  the  political  wing  of  the  Abolition  party 
(Gerrit  Smith's),  and  had  wandered  into  the  meeting, 
never  expecting  to  be  called  upon  to  speak.  At  the 
call  of  Frederick  Douglass  he  came  to  the  front,  and 
as  he  approached,  Rynders  exclaimed,  "  Well,  this  is 
the  original  nigger  !  "  "  I've  heard  of  the  magnani 
mity  of  Captain  Rynders,"  said  Ward  ;  "  but  the  half 
has  not  been  told  me."  And  then  he  "  went  on  with  a 
noble  voice,  and  his  speech  was  such  a  strain  of 
eloquence  as  I  never  heard  excelled  before  or  since." 
"  There  are  more  than  fifty  people  here,"  said  he, 
"  who  may  remember  me  as  a  little  black  boy  running 
about  the  streets  of  New  York.  I  have  always  been 
called  nigger,  and  the  only  consolation  that  has  been 
offered  me  for  being  called  nigger,  was  that,  when  I 
die  and  go  to  heaven,  I  shall  be  white.  If  " — and 
here,  with  an  earnestness  of  tone  and  manner  that 
thrilled  us  to  the  very  marrow,  he  continued — "  if  I 
cannot  go  to  heaven  as  black  as  God  made  me,  let  me 
go  down  to  hell,  and  dwell  with  the  devils  forever  !  " 
The  effect  was  beyond  description.  "  This  gentle 
man,"  he  said,  "  who  denies  our  humanity,  has 
examined  us  scientifically  ;  but  I  know  something  of 
anatomy.  I  have  kept  school,  and  I  have  had  pupils, 
from  the  jet-black  up  to  the  soft  dissolving  views  ;  and 
I  have  seen  white  boys  with  retreating  foreheads  and 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR."  185 

projecting  jaws,  and,  as  Dickens  says  in  '  Nicholas 
Nickleby'  of  Smike,  'you  might  knock  here  all  day,' 
tapping  his  forehead,  *  and  find  nobody  at  home.'  " 
In  this  strain  he  went  on  ruling  the  large  audience 
with  Napoleonic  power.  Coal-black  as  he  was,  he 
was  an  emperor.  When  he  ceased  speaking  the  time 
had  expired  for  which  the  Tabernacle  was  engaged, 
and  we  had  to  adjourn.  "  Never  was  there  a  grander 
triumph  of  intelligence  of  mind  over  brute  force. 
Two  colored  men,  whose  claim  to  be  considered 
human  was  denied,  had,  by  mere  force  of  intellect, 
overwhelmed  their  maligners  with  confusion." 

The  victory  would  have  been  complete  if  the  poli 
ticians  and  merchants,  whom  Rynders  served,  had 
not  ordered  him  to  go  back  to  the  Tabernacle 
next  day,  and  not  let  any  one  speak.  Burleigh's 
voice  was  drowned  that  day  by  shouts  of,  "  Oh,  let 
Douglass  shave  that  man,  and  make  a  wig  for  Garri 
son  !  "  Even  Phillips  was  silenced  by  cries  of,  "  This 
is  an  imposition  !  "  "A  white-washed  nigger  instead 
of  a  black  one  !  "  "  Put  him  out  !  "  "  Put  the  red 
head  do\vn  !  "  No  hall  or  church  in  the  city  could 
be  obtained  for  completing  the  business  of  the  society, 
which  had  to  elect  its  officers  and  pass  its  resolutions 
in  a  private  parlor. 

Such  manifestations  of  sympathy  with  the  South 
in  the  greatest  city  in  the  Union,  encouraged  Con 
gress  to  pass  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  which  provided 
that  the  trial  should  be  summary,  that  no  one  arrested 
under  it  should  be  heard  before  a  jury  or  allowed  to 
testify  in  his  own  behalf,  and  that  any  attempt  to 
prevent  kidnapping  might  be  punished  by  fines 
amounting  to  two  thousand  dollars,  and  also  by  six 


I  86  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

months  in  prison.  More  than  forty  colored  people 
left  Boston  within  three  days  after  the  signing  of  the 
bill,  on  September  18,  1850  ;  while  the  pastor  of  the 
Colored  Baptist  Church  in  Rochester  fled  with  every 
other  member,  except  two,  out  of  a  hundred  and 
fourteen,  to  Canada.  The  little  girls  in  that  city  used 
to  wonder  every  morning,  whether  they  should  see 
Mr.  Douglass  that  day  in  the  street,  or  hear  that  he 
had  been  carried  off  during  the  night.  Many  free 
negroes  were  enslaved  ;  but  he  was  able  not  only  to 
protect  himself  but  to  save  others.  He  was  an  active 
agent  of  the  Underground  Railroad  ;  and  a  large 
room  in  his  house  was  always  ready  for  fugitives. 
Once  he  had  eleven  there  together  ;  and  John  Brown 
made  them  a  speech.  When  any  new  arrival  took 
place,  the  little  Douglass  boys  would  go  to  and  fro 
collecting  funds,  to  pay  the  fare  on  the  steamer  across 
Lake  Ontario.  Several  instances  of  the  way  in  which 
Douglass  helped  men  who  were  in  especial  danger 
may  be  found  in  the  "  Life  and  Times  ;  "  and  there 
was  also  one  case  in  which  he  took  charge  of  a  very- 
small  fugitive  in  petticoats,  on  the  cars.  He  took  a 
seat  beside  the  child,  saying  very  kindly,  "  Well,  my 
little  girl."  The  reply  was  in  an  indignant  whisper, 
"  I'm  a  boy." 

The  "swarthy  Ajax,"  as  he  was  now  called,  put 
forth  all  his  powers  of  argument,  repartee,  ridicule, 
and  denunciation  against  the  supporters  of  the  wicked 
law.  Once,  when  he  was  speaking  in  Rochester,  he 
called  out,  "  Is  there  a  single  man  here,  who  would 
sell  his  brother  into  bondage?"  "I  would,"  said  a 
fellow  who  stood  in  the  rear.  "  Then  turn  your  face 
to  that  wall,"  thundered  the  orator.  He  spoke  with 


THE    "  NORTH    STAR."  187 

Wendell  Phillips,  Theodore  Parker,  and  Charles 
Francis  Adams,  on  October  14,  before  one  of  the 
largest  and  noblest  meetings  ever  held  in  Faneuil 
Hall.  He  found  time  even  then  to  appear  with 
Sojourner  Truth  before  the  Woman's  Rights  Conven 
tion,  which  was  held  in  Worcester,  October  23  and  24, 
with  the  result  of  leading  Mrs.  Taylor,  afterwards 
Mrs.  J.  S.  Mill,  to  write  a  powerful  article  in  the 
"Westminster  Review."  But  at  the  close  of  the 
month  he  was  back  in  Boston,  active  in  the  defense  of 
William  and  Ellen  Craft. 

These  two  slaves  had  made  their  escape,  eighteen 
months  before,  when  she  traveled  North  as  a  white 
gentleman  in  delicate  health,  and  took  her  husband 
as  her  servant.  They  were  picked  out  for  the  first  vic 
tims  in  Boston  ;  but  they  had  too  many  friends  there. 
She  was  secreted  at  once  ;  and  he  was  urged  to  fly ; 
but  he  declared  that  he  had  run  far  enough  already. 
He  even  refused  to  be  bought,  and  insisted  that  he 
wanted  to  test  the  law.  He  is  said  to  have  been  the 
coolest  man  in  Boston  ;  and  it  was  all  his  friends 
could  do  to  persuade  him  to  keep  out  of  sight,  and 
carry  several  dirks  and  pistols.  The  slave-hunters 
were  themselves  arrested,  for  calling  him  a  thief,  and 
were  followed  about  the  streets  by  hooting  crowds. 
The  Vigilance  Committee  met  every  night  in  a  dark 
ened  room,  and  there  it  was  finally  agreed,  in  the 
presence  of  Douglass,  that  a  deputation  should  be 
sent  to  warn  the  hunters  to  leave  the  town.  The 
name  of  Theodore  Parker  was  proposed  ;  but  Mr. 
Slack  said  it  would  be  better  not  to  have  any  clergy 
man  appointed.  "And  then,"  says  Douglass,  "  I  got  a 
peep  into  Parker's  soul."  He  said,  "  This  committee 


l88  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

can  appoint  me  to  no  duty  that  I  will  not  perform." 
The  passage  quoted  from  his  journal,  in  the  memoir  by 
John  Weiss,  shows  that  he  did  the  duty  so  faithfully 
that  the  birds  of  prey  fled  from  Boston  the  next  after 
noon. 

On  the  very  day  when  Parker  spoke  thus  to  the 
other  members  of  the  Vigilance  Committee,  George 
Thompson  arrived  in  Boston  from  England.  A 
reception  was  given  him  in  Faneuil  Hall  on  Novem 
ber  15,  but  a  party  of  pro-slavery  men  entered  before 
Garrison  had  half-finished  his  address  of  welcome, 
and  not  another  word  of  it  reached  the  ears  of  the 
audience.  Phillips  tried  to  get  a  hearing,  but  his 
voice  was  drowned  by  continuous  cheers  for  Daniel 
Webster,  a  common  way  in  those  days  of  answering 
anti-slavery  speeches.  Mr.  Thompson  himself  was 
greeted  by  all  sorts  of  noises.  Dogs  were  heard  to 
bark,  cocks  to  crow,  and  ducks  to  quack.  Yankee 
Doodle  was  whistled  furiously,  and  there  were  loud 
questions  about  how  many  babies  Queen  Victoria 
had,  and  how  she  was  treating  the  Irish  and  the  Hin 
doos.  The  member  of  Parliament  soon  left  in  dis 
gust,  and  then  Mrs.  Abby  Folsom  was  persuaded  to 
offer  some  inappropriate  and  inaudible  remarks. 
Theodore  Parker  came  forward  and  stood  for  some 
time,  pointing  to  the  portrait  of  Washington,  while 
no  one  could  hear  a  word,  except  the  loud  cries  that 
he  had  better  go  and  buy  a  bottle  of  Bogle's  Hyper 
ion  Fluid,  a  kind  of  hair-oil  then  in  vogue.  Neither 
Parker  Pillsbury  nor  Elizur  Wright  had  any  better 
success,  and  Douglass  stood  for  some  time,  pointing 
his  finger  at  the  audience,  with  the  utmost  contempt, 
amid  a  perfect  storm  of  hisses,  and  shouts  of  "  Hot 


THE  "NORTH  STAR."  189 

Corn,"  "Charcoal,"  etc.  All  sorts  of  things  were 
thrown  at  him,  and  a  man  who  stood  near  by  was  hit 
by  one  of  the  big  copper  cents,  then  current.  Big 
and  little  fights  were  now  going  on  all  over  the  hall  ; 
hats  were  smashed  ;  canes  were  being  flourished 
briskly  ;  women  fled  with  screams  ;  and  there  were 
dances,  accompanied  by  imitations  of  the  Indian 
war-whoop.  At  last  the  biggest  policeman  in  Boston 
stepped  out  upon  the  platform,  and  made  a  historic 
speech,  the  only  one  which  had  been  heard  from 
there  since  Garrison  was  first  interrupted.  "  Gentle 
men,"  said  Captain  Adams,  "  I  am  requested  by  the 
Marshal  to  inform  you  that  this  meeting  is  now 
adjourned." 

There  had  been  no  change  of  feeling  since  the 
slave-hunters  were  driven  away,  but  they  and  the  dis- 
unionists  were  considered  equally  worthy  of  execra 
tion  by  many  a  Bostonian.  The  North  did  not  like 
to  return  fugitives,  but  it  was  much  too  anxious  to 
keep  at  peace  with  the  South  ;  and  it  was  high  time 
to  speak  as  Frederick  Douglass  did  at  Rochester,  on 
December  i,  1850,  when  he  said  : 

"  While  this  nation  is  guilty  of  the  enslavement  of  three  mil 
lions  of  innocent  men  and  women,  it  is  as  idle  to  think  of  hav 
ing  a  sound  and  lasting  peace,  as  it  is  to  think  there  is  no  God 
to  take  cognizance  of  the  affairs  of  men.  There  can  be  no 
peace  to  the  wicked,  while  slavery  continues  in  the  land.  It 
will  be  condemned ;  and  while  it  is  condemned,  there  will  be 
agitation.  Nature  must  cease  to  be  nature;  men  must  become 
monsters;  humanity  must  be  transformed;  Christianity  must 
be  exterminated ;  all  ideas  of  justice  and  the  laws  of  eternal 
goodness  must  be  utterly  blotted  out  from  the  human  soul ;  ere 
a  system  so  foul  and  infernal  can  escape  condemnation,  or  this 
guilty  republic  can  have  a  sound,  enduring  peace." 


CHAPTER    VII. 

WITH    THE    MEN    WHO   ABOLISHED    SLAVERY. 

"  Against  his  sovereign,  Douglas  ne'er 
Will  level  a  rebellious  spear." 

— "  Lady  of  the  Lake." 

THE  "North  Star"  fully  justified  its  name  by 
enabling  its  editor  to  guide  fugitives  to  freedom  ; 
and  it  also  helped  him  to  free  himself  from  a 
peculiarly  Southern  view  of  the  United  States  Con 
stitution,  which  deprived  the  Garrisonians  of  the 
influence  they  deserved,  and  to  rise  to  that  higher  view 
which  soon  gained  the  supremacy  at  the  North.  Our 
estimate,  not  only  of  his  mental  caliber,  but  of  his 
fidelity  to  his  cause,  will  depend  largely  on  our 
opinion  about  this  question  ;  and  it  must  therefore  be 
examined  thoroughly. 

The  Abolitionists  were  either  disunionists,  or  else 
Free  Soilers  and  Liberty  party  men,  according  to 
their  view  of  the  Constitution  as  pro-slavery  or  anti- 
slavery.  Douglass  had  been  attacking  it  as  pro- 
slavery  ever  since  his  first  speech  in  1841  ;  but  on 
May  7,  1851,  when  the  A.  A.  S.  S.  was  obliged  to 
meet  in  Syracuse,  because  no  suitable  place  could  be 
found  in  New  York  City,  a  resolution  was  proposed, 
indorsing  the  "  Liberator  "  and  other  papers  as  anti- 
190 


WITH    THE    MEN    WHO    ABOLISHED    SLAVERY.          1 9! 

slavery  organs.  Some  one  asked  why  the  paper 
edited  by  Frederick  Douglass  was  not  on  the  list. 
Then  he  declared  that  he  preferred  to  be  left  out,  for 
he  had  more  sympathy  with  those  Abolitionists  who 
were  willing  to  vote,  than  with  those  who  would  not. 
He  had  then  been  carrying  on  his  paper  for  three 
years  and  a  half.  How  he  thought  at  that  time  may 
be  imagined  from  what  he  said,  a  few  years  later, 
in  a  lecture,  entitled  "  The  Anti-Slavery  Movement," 
and  published  in  Rochester,  1855.  In  speaking  of 
"  the  different  anti-slavery  sects,"  he  says  : 

"  I  shall  consider,  first,  the  Garrisonian  Anti-Slavery  Society. 
I  call  this  the  Garrisonian  Society,  because  Mr.  Garrison  is, 
confessedly,  its  leader.  This  Society  is  the  oldest  of  modern 
anti-slavery  societies.  It  has,  strictly  speaking,  two  weekly 
papers,  or  organs,  employs  five  or  six  lecturers,  and  holds 
numerous  public  meetings  for  the  dissemination  of  its  views. 
Its  peculiar  and  distinctive  feature  is  its  doctrine  of '  No  union 
with  slave-holders.'  This  doctrine  has,  of  late,  become  its  bond 
of  union,  and  the  condition  of  good  fellowship  among  its  mem 
bers.  Of  this  Society  I  have  to  say,  its  logical  result  is  but 
negatively  anti-slavery.  Its  doctrine  of  '  No  union  with  slave 
holders,'  carried  out,  dissolves  the  Union,  and  leaves  the  slaves 
and  their  masters  to  fight  their  own  battles,  in  their  own  way. 
This  I  hold  to  be  an  abandonment  of  the  great  idea  with  which 
that  Society  started.  It  started  to  free  the  slave.  It  ends  by 
leaving  the  slave  to  free  himself.  It  started  with  the  purpose 
to  jmbue  the  heart  of  the  nation  with  sentiments  favorable  to 
the  abolition  of  slavery,  and  ends  by  seeking  to  free  the  North 
from  all  responsibility  for  slavery,  other  than  if  slavery  were  in 
Great  Britain,  or  under  some  other  nationality.  This,  I  say,  is 
the  practical  abandonment  of  the  idea  with  which  that  Society 
started.  It  has  given  up  the  faith  that  the  slave  can  be  freed 
short  of  the  overthrow  of  the  Government ;  and  then,  as  I 
understand  that  Society,  it  leaves  the  slaves,  as  it  must  needs 


192  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

leave  them,  just  where  it  leaves  the  slaves  of  Cuba,  or  those  of 
Brazil.  The  nation,  as  such,  is  given  up  as  beyond  the  power 
of  salvation  by  the  foolishness  of  preaching;  and  hence,  the 
aim  is  now  to  save  the  North,  so  that  the  American  Anti-Slavery 
Society,  which  was  inaugurated  to  convert  the  nation,  after  ten 
years'  struggle,  parts  with  its  faith,  and  aims  now  to  save  the 
North.  One  of  the  most  eloquent  of  that  Society,  and  the  man 
who  is  only  second  to  Mr.  Garrison  himself,  defines  the  Garri- 
sonian  doctrine  thus:  '  All  the  slave  asks  of  us  is  to  stand  out 
of  his  way;  withdraw  our  pledge  to  keep  the  peace  on  the 
plantation ;  withdraw  our  pledge  to  return  him ;  withdraw  that 
representation  which  the  Constitution  gives  in  proportion  to  the 
number  of  slaves ;  and  without  any  agitation  here,  without  any 
individual  virtue,  which  the  times  have  eaten  out  of  us,  God 
will  vindicate  the  oppressed  by  the  laws  of  justice  which  he 
has  founded.  Trample  under  foot  your  own  unjust  pledges  ; 
break  to  pieces  your  compact  with  hell,  by  which  you  become 
the  abettor  of  oppression.  Stand  alone,  and  let  no  cement  of 
the  Union  bind  the  slave,  and  he  will  right  himself.' 

"  That  is  it.  '  Stand  alone.'  The  slave  is  to  '  right  himself.' 
I  dissent  entirely  from  this  reasoning.  It  assumes  to  be  true 
what  is  plainly  absurd,  and  that  is,  that  a  population  of  slaves, 
without  arms,  without  means  of  concert,  and  without  leisure, 
is  more  than  a  match  for  double  its  number,  educated,  accus 
tomed  to  rule,  and  in  every  respect  prepared  for  warfare,  offen 
sive  or  defensive.  This  Society,  therefore,  consents  to  leave 
the  slave's  freedom  to  a  most  uncertain  and  improbable,  if  not 
an  impossible,  contingency.  As  a  mere  expression  of  abhor 
rence  of  slavery,  the  sentiment  is  a  good  one  ;  but  it  expresses  no 
intelligible  principle  of  action,  and  throws  no  light  on  the  path 
way  of  duty.  Defined,  as  its  authors  define  it,  it  leads  to  false 
doctrines  and  mischievous  results.  It  condemns  Gerrit  Smith 
for  sitting  in  Congress,  and  our  Saviour  for  eating  with  publi 
cans  and  sinners.  Dr.  Spring  uttered  a  shocking  sentiment 
when  he  said,  if  one  prayer  of  his  would  emancipate  the  slaves, 
he  would  not  offer  that  prayer.  No  less  shocking  is  the  senti 
ment  of  the  leader  of  the  disunion  forces,  when  he  says,  that  if 


WITH    THE    MEN    WHO    ABOLISHED    SLAVERY.          193 

one  vote  of  his  would  emancipate  every  slave  in  this  country,  he 
would  not  cast  that  vote.  Here,  on  a  bare  theory,  and  for  a 
theory  which,  if  consistently  adhered  to,  would  drive  a  man  out 
of  the  world — a  theory  which  can  never  be  made  intelligible  to 
common  sense — the  freedom  of  the  whole  slave  population 
would  be  sacrificed. 

"But  again:  'No  union  with  slave-holders.'  I  dislike  the 
morality  of  this  sentiment,  in  its  application  to  the  point  at 
issue.  For  instance:  A.  unites  with  B.  in  stealing  my  property, 
and  carrying  it  away  to  California,  or  to  Australia  ;  and,  while 
there,  Mr.  A.  becomes  convinced  that  he  did  wrong  in  stealing 
my  property,  and  says  to  Mr.  B.,  'No  union  with  property- 
stealers,'  and  abandons  him,  leaving  the  property  in  his  hands. 
Now,  I  put  it  to  this  audience,  has  Mr.  A.  in  this  transaction 
met  with  the  requirements  of  stringent  morality  ?  He  certainly 
has  not.  It  is  not  only  his  duty  to  separate  from  the  thief,  but 
to  restore  the  stolen  property  to  its  owner.  And  I  hold  that  in 
the  Union,  this  very  thing  of  restoring  to  the  slave  his  long- 
lost  rights  can  better  be  accomplished  than  it  can  possibly  be 
accomplished  outside  of  the  Union.  This,  then,  is  my  answer 
to  the  motto,  '  No  Union  with  slave-holders.' 

"  But  this  is  not  the  worst  fault  of  this  Society.  Its  chief 
energies  are  expended  in  confirming  the  opinion,  that  the 
United  States  Constitution  is,  and  was,  intended  to  be  a  slave- 
holding  instrument — thus  piling  up,  between  the  slave  and  his 
freedom,  the  huge  work  of  the  abolition  of  the  Government,  as 
an  indispensable  condition  to  emancipation.  My  point  here  is, 
first,  the  Constitution  is,  according  to  its  reading,  an  anti- 
slavery  document ;  and  secondly,  to  dissolve  the  Union,  as  a 
means  to  abolish  slavery,  is  about  as  wise  as  it  would  be  to 
burn  up  this  city,  in  order  to  get  the  thieves  out  of  it.  But 
again,  we  hear  the  motto,  '  No  union  with  slave-holders ;  "  and 
I  answer  it,  as  that  noble  champion  of  liberty,  N.  P.  Rogers, 
answered  it  with  a  more  sensible  motto,  namely — '  No  union 
with  slave-holding.'  I  would  unite  with  anybody  to  do  right, 
and  with  nobody  to  do  wrong.  And  as  the  Union,  under  the 
Constitution,  requires  me  to  do  nothing  which  is  wrong,  and 


194  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

gives  me  many  facilities  for  doing  good,  I  cannot  go  with  the 
American  Anti-Slavery  Society  in  its  doctrine  of  disunion." 

A  more  complete  statement  of  his  position  was 
made  in  1860,  when,  in  reply  to  the  attack  made  upon 
his  views  by  George  Thompson,  he  delivered  a  speech, 
entitled  "  The  Constitution  of  the  United  States  :  is 
it  Pro-slavery  or  Anti-slavery  ? "  He  meets  the  prin 
cipal  objections  of  the  Garrisonians  to  the  Constitu 
tion  thus  : 

"  It  gives  representatives  to  the  South  for  three-fifths  of  its 
slaves  ;  but  what  does  that  amount  to  ?  It  is  a  downright  dis 
ability  laid  upon  the  slave-holding  States,  one  which  deprives 
those  States  of  two-fifths  of  their  natural  basis  of  representa 
tion.  Instead  of  encouraging  slavery,  the  Constitution  encour 
ages  freedom,  by  giving  an  increase  of  two-fifths  of  political 
power  to  free  over  slave  States." 

There  is  also  a  clause  about  importation  of  per 
sons  ;  but 

"  It  should  be  remembered  that  this  very  provision,  if  made 
to  refer  to  the  African  slave-trade  at  all,  makes  the  Constitution 
anti-slavery  instead  of  pro-slavery;  for  it  says  to  the  slave 
States,  the  price  you  will  have  to  pay  for  coming  into  the  Amer 
ican  Union  is,  that  the  slave-trade,  which  you  could  carry  on 
indefinitely  out  of  the  Union,  shall  be  put  an  end  to  in  fifty 
years,  if  you  come  into  the  Union."  .  .  .  "It  looked  to  the 
abolition  of  slavery  rather  than  to  its  perpetuity." 

There  is  also  a  clause  about  suppressing  riots  : 

"  I  will  be  generous  here,  as  well  as  elsewhere,  and  grant  that 
it  applies  to  slave-insurrections.  Let  us  suppose  that  an  anti- 
slavery  man  is  President  of  the  United  States,  (and  the  day  that 
shall  see  this  case  is  not  distant)  ;  and  this  very  power  of  sup 
pressing  slave-insurrection  would  put  an  end  to  slavery."  .  .  . 
"  If  it  should  turn  out  that  slavery  is  a  source  of  insurrection, 


WITH    THE    MEN    WHO    ABOLISHED    SLAVERY.         195 

that  there  is  no  security  from  insurrections  while  slavery  lasts, 
why  the  Constitution  would  be  best  obeyed  by  putting  an  end 
to  slavery." 

This  prophecy  was  made  on  March  26,  1860,  before 
Lincoln  was  even  nominated.  Of  the  so-called  "  Fug 
itive  slave  clause,"  it  is  correctly  remarked  that  here, 
as  in  the  other  three  cases,  there  is  nothing  in  the 
Constitution  to  show  that  slaves  were  thought  of. 
There  was  an  attempt  to  make  the  words  plainer  ; 
but  it  failed.  "  The  Convention  would  not  consent 
to  the  idea,  that  property  in  man  should  be  admitted 
into  the  Constitution."  As  the  clause  stands,  it  can 
refer  only  to  apprentices  and  others  who  have  bound 
themselves  over  to  service  ;  the  words  "  Person  held 
to  service  or  labor  in  one  State,  under  the  laws  there 
of,"  did  not,  in  the  opinion  of  Douglass,  apply  to  the 
slave  ;  for  "  He  is  not  described  in  it.  He  is  a  simple 
article  of  property." 

It  would,  I  suspect,  have  been  better  to  say  that,  as 
the  slave  was  here,  and  in  the  clauses  about  repre 
sentation  and  importation,  acknowledged  to  be  a 
person,  he  was  entitled  to  the  full  benefit  of  the  Fifth 
Amendment,  which  declares  that  "  No  person  shall  " 
..."  be  deprived  of  life,  liberty,  or  property,  without 
due  process  of  law."  As  soon  as  these  words  could 
be  appealed  to  before  unprejudiced  judges,  they 
would  have  amply  protected  fugitive  slaves  ;  and 
their  surrender,  as  well  as  every  other  attempt  to  assert 
a  right  of  property  in  man,  would  have  become 
illegal  as  soon  as  the  Supreme  Court  should  give  due 
heed  to  a  fact  which  was  stated  in  the  Senate  by  the 
author  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill  in  1850  ;  namely, 
that  there  was  not  "  A  single  State  in  which  the  insti- 


196  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

tution  is  established  by  positive  law."  What  Doug 
lass  thought  of  the  guarantees  in  the  Constitution  is 
stated  as  follows  in  the  speech  of  1860,  which,  it  must 
be  remembered,  was  directed  against  Thompson, 
rather  than  Garrison  : 

"  Its  language  is,  '  We  the  people  ; '  not  we  the  white  people, 
not  even  we  the  citizens,  not  we  the  privileged  class,  not  we 
the  high,  not  we  the  low,  but  we  the  people  ;  not  we  the  horses, 
sheep,  and  swine,  and  wheelbarrows,  but  we  the  people,  we  the 
human  inhabitants ;  and,  if  negroes  are  people,  they  are 
included  in  the  benefits  for  which  the  Constitution  of  America 
was  ordained  and  established.  But  how  dare  any  man  who 
pretends  to  be  the  friend  to  the  negro  thus  gratuitously  concede 
away  what  the  negro  has  a  right  to  claim  under  the  Constitu 
tion  ?  Why  should  such  friends  invent  new  arguments  to 
increase  the  hopelessness  of  his  bondage  ?  This,  I  undertake 
to  say,  as  the  conclusion  of  the  whole  matter,  that  the  constitu 
tionality  of  slavery  can  be  made  out  only  by  disregarding  the 
plain  and  common-sense  reading  of  the  Constitution  itself ;  by 
disregarding  and  casting  away  as  worthless  the  most  beneficent 
rules  of  legal  interpretation ;  by  ruling  the  negro  outside  of 
these  beneficent  rules  ;  by  claiming  everything  for  slavery ;  by 
denying  everything  for  freedom ;  by  assuming  that  the  Consti 
tution  does  not  mean  what  it  says,  and  that  it  says  what  it  does 
not  mean  ;  by  disregarding  the  written  Constitution,  and  inter 
preting  it  in  the  light  of  a  secret  understanding.  It  is  in  this 
mean,  contemptible,  and  underhand  method  that  the  American 
Constitution  is  pressed  into  the  service  of  slavery.  They  go 
everywhere  else  for  proof  that  the  Constitution  is  pro-slavery, 
but  to  the  Constitution  itself.  The  Constitution  declares  that 
no  person  shall  be  deprived  of  life,  liberty,  or  property,  without 
due  process  of  law  ;  it  secures  to  every  man  the  right  of  trial 
by  jury,  the  privilege  of  the  writ  of  habeas  corpus — that  great 
writ  that  put  an  end  to  slavery  and  slave-hunting  in  England  ; 
it  secures  to  every  State  a  republican  form  of  government. 
Any  one  of  these  provisions  in  the  hands  of  Abolition  States- 


WITH    THE    MEN    WHO    ABOLISHED    SLAVERY.          197 

men,  and  backed  up  by  a  right  moral  sentiment,  would  put  an 
end  to  slavery  in  America." 

He  concludes  with  these  arguments  to  prove  that, 

"  The  way  to  abolish  slavery  in  America  is  to  vote  such  men 
into  power,  as  will  use  their  powers  for  the  abolition  of  slavery. 

..."  My  argument  against  the  dissolution  of  the  American 
Union  is  this  :  It  would  place  the  slave  system  more  exclu 
sively  under  the  control  of  the  slave-holding  States,  and  with 
draw  it  from  the  power  in  the  Northern  States  which  is 
opposed  to  slavery.  Slavery  is  essentially  barbarous  in  its 
character.  It,  above  all  things  else,  dreads  the  presence  of  an 
advanced  civilization.  It  nourishes  best  where  it  meets  no 
reproving  frowns,  and  hears  no  condemning  voices.  While  in 
the  Union  it  will  meet  with  both.  Its  hope  of  life  in  the  last 
resort  is  to  get  out  of  the  Union.  I  am,  therefore,  for  drawing 
the  bond  of  the  Union  more  closely,  and  bringing  the  slave 
States  more  completely  under  the  power  of  the  free  States. 
What  they  most  dread,  that  I  most  desire.  I  have  much 
confidence  in  the  instincts  of  the  slave-holders.  They  see  that 
the  Constitution  will  afford  slavery  no  protection,  when  it  shall 
cease  to  be  administered  by  slave-holders.  They  see,  more 
over,  that  if  there  is  once  a  will  in  the  people  of  America  to 
abolish  slavery,  there  is  no  word,  no  syllable  in  the  Constitution 
to  forbid  that  result.  They  see  that  the  Constitution  has  not 
saved  slavery  in  Rhode  Island,  in  Connecticut,  in  New  York,  or 
Pennsylvania ;  that  the  free  States  have  increased  from  one  up 
to  eighteen  in  number,  while  the  slave  States  have  only  added 
three  to  their  original  number.  There  were  twelve  slave  States 
at  the  beginning  of  the  Government :  there  are  fifteen  now. 
There  wras  one  free  State  at  the  beginning  of  the  Government : 
there  are  eighteen  now.  The  dissolution  of  the  Union  would 
not  give  the  North  a  single  advantage  over  slavery,  but  would 
take  from  it  many.  Within  the  Union  we  have  a  firm  basis  of 
opposition  to  slavery.  It  is  opposed  to  all  the  great  objects  of 
the  Constitution.  The  dissolution  of  the  Union  is  not  only  an 


198  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

unwise  but  a  cowardly  measure — fifteen  millions  running  away 
from  three  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  slave-holders.  Mr. 
Garrison  and  his  friends  tell  us  that  while  in  the  Union  we  are 
responsible  for  slavery.  He  and  they  sing  out  '  No  union  with 
slave-holders,'  and  refuse  to  vote.  I  admit  our  responsibility 
for  slavery  while  in  the  Union ;  but  I  deny  that  going  out  of 
the  Union  would  free  us  from  that  responsibility.  There  now 
clearly  is  no  freedom  from  responsibility  for  slavery  to  any 
American  citizen  short  of  the  abolition  of  slavery.  The 
American  people  have  gone  quite  too  far  in  this  slave-holding 
business  now,  to  sum  up  their  whole  business  with  slavery  by 
singing  out  the  cant  phrase,  '  No  union  with  slave-holders ! ' 
To  desert  the  family-hearth  may  place  the  recreant  husband 
out  of  the  presence  of  his  starving  children,  but  this  does  not 
free  him  from  responsibility.  If  a  man  were  on  board  of  a 
pirate  ship,  and,  in  company  with  others,  had  robbed  and 
plundered,  his  whole  duty  would  not  be  performed  simply  by 
taking  the  long-boat  and  singing  out,  '  No  union  with  pirates.' 
His  duty  would  be  to  restore  the  stolen  property.  The 
American  people  in  the  Northern  States  have  helped  to  enslave 
the  black  people.  Their  duty  will  not  have  been  done  until 
they  give  them  back  their  plundered  rights.  Reference  was 
made  at  the  City  Hall  to  my  having  once  held  other  opinions, 
and  very  different  opinions  to  those  I  have  now  expressed.  An 
old  speech  of  mine,  delivered  fourteen  years  ago,  was  read  to 
show,  I  know  not  what,  that  I  am  not  infallible.  If  so,  I  have 
to  say  in  defense  that  I  never  pretended  to  be.  Although  I 
cannot  accuse  myself  of  being  remarkably  unstable,  I  do  not 
pretend  that  I  have  never  altered  my  opinion  both  in  respect  to 
men  and  things.  Indeed,  I  have  been  very  much  modified  both 
in  feeling  and  opinion  within  the  last  fourteen  years.  When  I 
escaped  from  slavery,  and  was  introduced  to  the  Garrisonians, 
I  adopted  very  many  of  their  opinions,  and  defended  them  just 
as  long  as  I  deemed  them  true.  I  was  young,  had  read  but 
little,  and  naturally  took  some  things  on  trust.  Subsequent 
experience  and  reading  have  led  me  to  examine  for  myself. 
This  has  brought  me  to  other  conclusions.  When  I  was  a 


WITH    THE    MEN    WHO    ABOLISHED    SLAVERY.         199 

child,  I  thought  and  spoke  like  a  child.  But  the  question  is  not 
as  to  what  were  my  opinions  fourteen  years  ago,  but  what  they 
are  now.  If  I  am  right  now,  it  really  does  not  matter  what  I 
was  fourteen  years  ago.  My  position  now  is  one  of  reform,  not 
of  revolution  ;  I  would  act  for  the  abolition  of  slavery  through 
the  Government — not  over  its  ruins.  If  slave-holders  have 
ruled  the  American  Government  for  the  last  fifty  years,  let  the 
anti-slavery  men  rule  for  the  next  fifty  years.  If  the  South  has 
made  the  Constitution  bend  to  the  purposes  of  slavery,  let  the 
North  now  make  that  instrument  bend  to  the  cause  of  freedom 
and  justice.  If  three  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  slave-holders 
have,  by  devoting  their  energies  to  that  single  end,  been  able  to 
make  slaver}'  the  vital  and  animating  spirit  of  the  American 
Confederacy  for  the  last  seventy-two  years,  now  let  the  freemen 
of  the  North,  who  have  the  power  in  their  own  hands,  and  who 
can  make  the  American  Government  just  what  they  think  fit, 
resolve  to  blot  out  forever  the  foul  and  haggard  crime,  which  is 
the  blight  and  mildew,  the  curse  and  the  disgrace  of  the  whole 
United  States." 

Douglass  said,  in  March,  1860,  what  was  not 
admitted  even  then  by  the  Garrisonians,  although 
it  had  been  urged  repeatedly  during  the  previous 
twenty  years,  first  by  the  Liberty  party  men,  then  by 
the  Free  Soilers,  and  finally  by  the  Republicans. 
The  Constitution  was  no  finality,  but  merely  an 
instrument  for  enabling  the  majority  to  carry  out  its 
will  with  due  respect  for  individual  rights.  If  the 
Constitution  seemed  pro-slavery,  it  was  only  because 
that  was  the  opinion  of  the  majority.  There  never 
was  any  reason  to  doubt  that,  as  soon  as  slavery 
should  be  condemned  by  the  people,  the  Constitu 
tion  would  either  be  acknowledged  to  be  anti-slavery 
or  else  would  be  made  so.  The  Abolitionists  would 
not  have  been  prevented  by  it  from  adopting  measures 


2OO  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

which  would  ultimately  have  put  an  end  to  slavery. 
All  they  needed  was  a  continual  gain  in  strength  ;  and 
it  was  the  probability  that  the  Constitution  would 
soon  be  interpreted  in  their  favor,  which  caused  the 
Southerners  to  acknowledge  its  anti-slavery  tenden 
cies  by  seceding. 

The  fact  that  secession  led  to  emancipation  is 
sometimes  brought  up  as  proof  that  the  Garrisonians 
were  right.  But  secession  would  not  have  destroyed 
slavery,  if  the  seceders  had  not  been  slave-holders. 
If  it  had  been  the  Abolitionists  who  seceded,  it  would 
have  been  their  cause  which  was  lost.  What  actually 
destroyed  slavery  was  that  feeling  which  Garrison 
and  Phillips  had  done  their  best  to  root  out,  that  love 
for  the  Union  which  insisted  on  preserving  it  at  any 
cost,  even  that  of  resorting  to  emancipation  as  a  war 
measure.  Most  of  the  men  who  fought  to  free  the 
slave  would  have  fought  against  any  attempt  to 
break  up  the  Union  for  his  benefit.  Suppose  New 
England  had  seceded  because  of  the  Fugitive  Slave 
Bill.  Attempts  would  certainly  have  been  made  to 
execute  it,  and  would  have  been  resisted  sternly. 
The  conflict  would  soon  have  become  bloody,  and 
there  would  have  been  an  uprising  of  the  people,  like 
that  in  1861.  The  only  difference  is  that  the  Southern 
soldiers  would  have  been  supported  by  those  of  the 
Western  and  Middle  States,  as  well  as  by  the  regular 
army  ;  the  anti-slavery  Confederacy  would  have 
fallen  ;  abolitionism  would  have  been  suppressed  as 
treason  ;  and  slavery  would  have  gained  a  new  lease 
of  life.  Or  if  we  suppose  simply  that  all  the  anti- 
slavery  men  had  become  non-voting  disunionists,  but 
had  never  been  able  to  persuade  a  single  State  to 


WITH    THE    MEN    WHO    ABOLISHED    SLAVERY.         2OI 

secede,  it  is  by  no  means  improbable  that  there  would 
be  a  slave-holder  in  the  White  House  to-day.  In 
order  to  do  full  justice  to  the  men  who  kept  abolition 
ism  sufficiently  on  constitutional  ground  to  secure  a 
final  triumph,  I  must  take  the  liberty  of  comparing 
those  who  would  not  even  acknowledge  them  as  fel 
low-soldiers  in  the  army  of  freedom,  to  the  old  man 
who  is  said  to  have  been  so  much  annoyed  by  the 
howling  of  a  dog  on  his  door-step,  one  winter's  night, 
that  he  jumped  out  of  bed  and  rushed  into  the  snow. 
By  and  by  his  wife  called  out  to  know  what  he  was 
doing.  "  Only  trying  to  freeze  this  blamed  dog  to 
death." 

The  facts  of  history  justified  Douglass  in  saying 
what  he  did,  in  1882,  of  the  movement  with  which  he 
refused  to  work  in  1848  : 

44  Anti-slavery  thus  far  had  been  only  sheet  lightning ;  the 

Buffalo  convention  sought  to  make  it  a  thunderbolt." 

41  This  Buffalo  convention  of  Free  Soilers,  however  low  was 
their  standard,  did  lay  the  foundation  of  a  grand  superstructure. 
It  was  a  powerful  link  in  the  chain  of  events  by  which  the  slave 
system  has  been  abolished,  the  slave  emancipated,  and  the 
country  saved  from  dismemberment."  ("Life  and  Times," 
pp.  314,315-) 

He  says,  in  a  letter  not  before  printed  : 

44 1  was  a  non-voter  in  1848,  though  deeply  interested  in  the 
Free  Soil  movement,  inaugurated  in  the  Buffalo  convention  in 
that  year.  Before  1852  I  became  a  sound  convert  to  the  doc 
trine  of  the  unconstitutionality  of  slavery  and  the  duty  of  voting 
against  slavery." 

He  adds  that  he  gave  "  active  support  to  all  the 
candidates  nominated  thereafter,  from  Hale  to 
Lincoln." 


202  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

The  "  North  Star"  changed  its  name  at  the  time 
that  its  editor  changed  his  views.  He  says  that  there 
were  "  I  know  not  how  many  other  stars  in  the  news 
paper  firmament,"  and  in  order  to  avoid  confusion, 
the  name  of  "  Frederick  Douglass's  Paper "  was 
adopted  at  the  beginning  of  the  fourth  volume,  in 
December,  1850.  In  1852  it  contained  more  news, 
more  poetry,  more  humor,  more  about  politics,  and 
more  about  Woman's  Rights  and  other  new  reforms 
than  had  been  found  in  the  "  North  Star."  Mr.  Ward 
was  prominent  among  the  colored  contributors,  and 
among  the  white  ones  were  J.  G.  Birney  and  Gerrit 
Smith.  The  friend  last  named  was  president  of  the 
New  York  State  Anti-Slavery  Society,  which  Doug 
lass  helped  to  revise  and  served  as  corresponding 
secretary.  Its  platform  declares  that  slavery  cannot 
be  made  legal,  and  its  first  meeting  was  at  Rochester, 
on  March  18,  1852,  two  days  before  the  publication  of 
"  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin."  That  city  was  chosen  as  the 
place  for  the  subsequent  meetings,  which  were  not 
numerous. 

The  Free  Soilers  gave  a  cordial  welcome  to  their 
new  ally  at  the  meeting  of  the  Ohio  Anti-Slavery 
Society,  on  May  5,  at  Cincinnati,  where  he  was  made 
vice-president  ;  and  there  Burleigh  argued  for  dis 
union,  while  Julian  defended  the  men  who  made  him 
one  of  their  candidates  in  this  year's  campaign.  Our 
Douglass  devoted  himself  mainly  to  exposing  the 
short-comings  of  the  Church,  and  his  speech  con 
tained  the  following  characteristic  passage  : 

"  In  this  connection  I  am  always  forcibly  reminded  of  the 
incomparable  illustration  of  the  principle  of  brotherly  love  in 
the  New  Testament.  When  the  stranger  fell  among  thieves, 


WITH    THE    MEN    WHO    ABOLISHED    SLAVERY.         203 

and  was  left  alone  on  the  highways  to  perish,  there  came  along 
three  persons,  severally  representing  the  classes  in  society. 
First  came  the  priest — evidently  all  priest  and  no  humanity — 
who  passed  by  entirely  '  on  the  other  side,'  and  his  successors 
appear  to  have  remained  on  the  other  side  to  this  time. 
[Laughter.]  Then  came  another,  a  deacon,  probably;  he 
seemed  half-man  and  half-priest,  for  he  took  a  middle  course, 
and  seemed  wavering ;  but,  unfortunately,  the  priest  predom 
inated,  and  he  followed  '  in  the  footsteps  of  his  illustrious  pre 
decessor  '  on  the  other  side.  [Great  laughter.]  But,  my 
friends,  there  next  came  that  way  a  man,  nothing  but  a  man  ; 
yes,  a  regular  human ;  [renewed  laughter]  and  he  went 
straight  up  to  the  suffering  stranger,  bound  up  his  wounds, 
and  attended  to  all  his  wants.  [Laughter.]  [The  peculiar  and 
inimitable  facial  contortions  setting  off  this  narrative,  can  only 
be  imagined  by  those  who  have  listened  to  Tom  Corvvin.]  I 
can  always  distinguish  the  class  of  time-serving  clergymen, 
wherever  I  meet  them,  in  the  railroad  car  or  steamboat — that 
is,  when  they  condescend  to  occupy  the  same  car  and  cabin — 
if  they  approach  one  of  my  color  at  all,  the  first  question  is — 
not  '  Do  you  love  your  neighbor,  your  brother  man  ? '  But, 
'  do  you  love  God  ? '  [Another  unreportable  expression  of 
countenance.]  But,  my  friends,  let  me  be  understood.  It  is 
the  faithless  and  recreant  priesthood  I  would  hold  up ;  not 
the  true  servants  of  an  impartial  God,  who  created  us  all  in 
his  likeness.  I  will  never  be  driven  off  the  platform  of  the 
Christian  religion  in  fighting  slavery.  [Great  applause.]  But 
my  heart  goes  out  only  to  a  practical  religion.  I  see  in 
this  convention  an  exhibition  of  adherence  to  the  vitality  of 
religion.  Christianity  works  thus,  not  alone  with  the  rich  and 
strong,  but  it  reaches  its  long,  beneficent  arm  down  to  seize 
and  bear  up  the  last  link  of  humanity.  [Applause.]  Such 
Christianity  is  embodied  in  the  great  anti-slavery  movement 
of  the  nineteenth  century — it  is  expressed  in  the  resolution 
before  us.  I  am  heartily  in  favor  of  it." 

It  is  sad  to  see  that  after  this  eulogy  upon  the  Good 


204  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

Samaritan,  he  failed  to  meet  him  at  the  convention  of 
the  A.  A.  S.  S.  one  week  later  in  Rochester.  There 
he  had  to  defend  his  change  of  views,  and  hear  him 
self  denounced  as  a  deserter  by  Garrison,  Phillips, 
Remond,  Mrs.  Abby  Kelley  Foster,  and  her  husband, 
Stephen.  Among  other  offenses  were  his  advocating 
the  Homestead  Bill  and  his  praising  Kossuth.  He 
was  so  provoked  at  Remond's  thanking  God  for  not 
being  the  son  of  a  slave,  that  he  made  this  allusion 
to  the  occupation  of  his  critic's  father,  "  I  thank  God 
that  I  am  neither  a  barber  nor  the  son  of  a  barber." 
Another  colored  man  compared  him  to  a  castaway, 
who  had  been  picked  up  by  the  ship  of  which  Garri 
son  was  captain,  had  tried  in  vain  to  get  himself  into 
command,  and  then  had  stolen  a  boat  and  fled.  Garri 
son  believed  so  firmly  in  disunionism,  that  it  seemed 
to  him  impossible  that  any  of  his  disciples  had  found 
a  single  error  in  the  creed.  He  thought  it  his  con 
scientious  duty  to  bring  a  charge  of  mercenary 
motives  against  the  friend,  who  had  founded  the 
"  North  Star  "  with  money  which  he  might  honorably 
have  invested  for  the  benefit  of  his  family;  who  sank 
in  the  enterprise,  before  1856,  at  least  twelve  thousand 
dollars  of  his  own  earnings,  according  to  the  testi 
mony  of  a  competent  and  trustworthy  writer,  in  the 
Introduction  to  "  My  Bondage  and  my  Freedom  ; " 
and  who  had  made  his  house  not  only  a  refuge  for 
fugitives,  but  a  free  boarding-house  for  poor  colored 
boys  who  were  invited  there  to  learn  the  trade  of 
printing.  No  wonder  that  an  exile  from  Hungary 
said  to  one  of  my  friends  with  uplifted  hands,  "  If  I 
attend  any  more  of  your  anti-slavery  meetings  they 
will  make  me  a  pro-slavery  man." 


WITH    THE    MEN    WHO    ABOLISHED    SLAVERY.         205 

Douglass  said  some  years  later,  in  his  reply  to 
George  Thompson  : 

"  No  personal  assaults  shall  ever  lead  me  to  forget  that  some 
who  in  America  have  often  made  me  the  subject  of  personal 
abuse,  are  at  the  same  time,  in  their  own  way,  earnestly  work 
ing  for  the  abolition  of  slavery.  They  are  men  who  thoroughly 
understand  the  principle  that  he  who  is  not  for  them  is  against 
them  ;  but  unfortunately  they  do  not  seem  to  understand  that 
he  who  is  not  against  them  is  on  their  side." 

He  has  since  remarked,  that  "  Mr.  Garrison  sent  a 
great  many  people  to  perdition  who  obstinately 
refused  to  go."  Among  them,  by  the  way,  were 
Longfellow,  Sumner,  and  Channing.  The  columns  of 
"  Frederick  Douglass's  Paper,"  for  1852  and  1853,  are 
entirely  free  from  any  bitterness  against  his  assail 
ants  ;  and  in  the  latter  year  he  said,  at  the  May  meet 
ing,  held  at  New  York  by  the  Tappans  and  other 
non-Garrisonian  Abolitionists  : 

"  I  honor  and  respect  Lewis  Tappan ;  I  love  and  honor 
William  Lloyd  Garrison ;  and  may  God  have  mercy  upon  me 
when  I  refuse  to  strike  a  blow  against  slavery  in  connection 
with  either  gentleman.  I  will  work  with  either ;  and  if  the  one 
discards  me  because  I  work  with  the  other,  the  responsibility  is 
not  mine." 

The  Garrisonians,  however,  continued  to  attack 
him  so  fiercely  that  there  seemed  likely,  as  the  "  Syra 
cuse  Journal  "  said,  "To  be  a  war  between  the  white 
and  black  roses."  Mrs.  Swisshelm,  who  was  in 
hearty  sympathy  with  the  anti-slavery  movement,  as 
well  as  with  that  in  behalf  of  her  sex,  says  in  her  own 
paper,  the  "  Saturday  Visitor  :  "  "  We  do  believe  that 
the  '  Liberator,'  *  Standard  '  and  *  Freeman  '  might  be 
better  employed  than  in  black-balling  a  black  man." 


206  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

She  adds,  in  reference  to  a  charge  about  neglecting 
Mrs.  Douglass,  which  drew  out  an  indignant  letter  of 
denial  from  the  latter,  and  is  fully  refuted  by  one 
quoted  at  the  close  of  the  next  chapter  :  "  In  all  our 
experience  of  very  bitter  newspaper  warfare,  we  never 
saw  the  equal  of  this  ;  and  for  all  we  can  see,  the  three 
able  papers  that  have  united  to  crush  Mr.  Douglass, 
have  failed  to  bring  a  particle  of  proof  that  he  is  not 
as  good  and  true  as  he  is  eloquent  and  energetic." 
He  finally  found  it  due  to  his  family  as  well  as  to 
himself,  that  he  should  reply  once  for  all.  Twelve 
columns  of  his  paper  are  occupied  with  an  answer 
which  meets  all  the  charges,  and  declares  that  this  is 
done  "  not  to  re-open,  but  if  possible  to  close  up  our 
account  with  these  anti-slavery  journals.  For  our 
selves,"  he  adds,  "  we  have  not  now,  as  we  had  not 
in  the  beginning,  the  slightest  wish  to  be  embroiled 
in  personal  conflict  with  anti-slavery  men  of  any  sort. 
There  is  better  work  for  all  of  us  to  do  than  to  keep 
up  a  warfare  against  each  other." 


CHAPTER    VIII. 

"  THE     MAN     WHO     IS     RIGHT     IS    A    MAJORITY." 

THE  kidnapper's  dogma,  that  the  Constitution  is 
pro-slavery,  was  carried  out  by  both  of  the  great 
parties,  in  June,  1852,  to  its  logical  results,  namely, 
that  hunting  after  fugitives  ought  to  be  kept  up,  and 
agitation  against  slavery  ought  to  be  put  down.  It 
was  these  collars,  showing  ownership  by  the  South, 
that  were  clasped  about  the  necks  of  both  of  the 
favorite  runners  in  the  race  to  the  White  House, 
Pierce  and  Scott.  Scarcely  had  this  been  done,  when 
Douglass  said,  at  the  celebration  of  the  Declaration  of 
Independence : 

"  Fellow-citizens,  above  your  national,  tumultuous  joy,  I  hear 
the  mournful  wail  of  millions,  whose  chains,  heavy  and  grievous 
yesterday,  are  to-day  rendered  more  intolerable  by  the  jubilant 
shouts  that  reach  them.  If  I  do  forget,  if  I  do  not  faithfully 
remember  those  bleeding  children  of  sorrow  this  day,  '  may  my 
right  hand  forget  her  cunning,  and  may  my  tongue  cleave  to  the 
roof  of  my  mouth  ! '  To  forget  them,  to  pass  lightly  over  their 
wrongs,  and  to  chime  in  with  the  popular  theme,  would  be 
treason  most  scandalous  and  shocking,  and  would  make  me  a 
reproach  before  God  and  the  world.  My  subject,  then,  fellow- 
citizens,  is  '  American  Slavery.'  I  shall  see  this  day  and  its 
popular  characteristics  from  the  slave's  point  of  view.  Stand- 
207 


208  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

ing  there,  identified  with  the  American  bondman,  making  his 
wrongs  mine,  I  do  not  hesitate  to  declare,  with  all  my  soul,  that 
the  character  and  conduct  of  this  nation  never  looked  blacker  to 
me  than  on  this  Fourth  of  July.  Whether  we  turn  to  the 
declarations  of  the  past  or  to  the  professions  of  the  present,  the 
conduct  of  the  nation  seems  equally  hideous  and  revolting. 
America  is  false  to  the  past,  false  to  the  present,  and  solemnly 
binds  herself  to  be  false  to  the  future.  Standing  with  God  and 
the  crushed  and  bleeding  slave  on  this  occasion,  I  will,  in  the 
name  of  humanity  which  is  outraged,  in  the  name  of  liberty 
which  is  fettered,  in  the  name  of  the  Constitution  and  the 
Bible  which  are  disregarded  and  trampled  upon,  dare  call  in 
question  and  denounce  with  all  the  emphasis  I  can  command, 
everything  that  serves  to  perpetuate  slavery,  the  great  sin  and 
shame  of  America!  '  I  will  not  equivocate  ;  I  will  not  excuse  ; ' 
I  will  use  the  severest  language  I  can  command  ;  and  yet  not  one 
word  shall  escape  me  that  any  man,  whose  judgment  is  not 
blinded  by  prejudice,  or  who  is  not  at  heart  a  slave-holder,  shall 
not  confess  to  be  right  and  just. 

"  But  I  fancy  I  hear  some  one  of  my  audience  say,  it  is  just  in 
this  circumstance  that  you  and  your  brother  Abolitionists  fail  to 
make  a  favorable  impression  on  the  public  mind.  Would  you 
argue  more  and  denounce  less,  would  you  persuade  more  and 
rebuke  less,  your  cause  would  be  much  more  likely  to  succeed. 
But,  I  submit,  where  all  is  plain,  there  is  nothing  to  be  argued. 
What  point  in  the  anti-slavery  creed  would  you  have  me  argue  ? 
On  what  branch  of  the  subject  do  the  people  of  this  country 
need  light?  Must  I  undertake  to  prove  that  the  slave  is  a  man  ? 
That  point  is  conceded  already.  Nobody  doubts  it.  The 
slave-holders  themselves  acknowledge  it  in  the  enactment  of 
laws  for  their  government.  They  acknowledge  it,  when  they 
punish  disobedience  on  the  part  of  the  slave.  There  are  seventy- 
two  crimes  in  the  State  of  Virginia,  which,  if  committed  by  a 
black  man  (no  matter  how  ignorant  he  be),  subject  him  to  the 
punishment  of  death  ;  while  only  two  of  these  same  crimes  will 
subject  a  white  man  to  the  like  punishment.  What  is  this  but 
the  acknowledgment  that  the  slave  is  a  moral,  intellectual,  and 


"  THE    MAN    WHO    IS    RIGHT    IS    A    MAJORITY."        2OQ 

responsible  being.  The  manhood  of  the  slave  is  conceded.  It 
is  admitted  in  the  fact  that  Southern  statute  books  are  covered 
with  enactments,  forbidding,  under  severe  fines  and  penalties, 
the  teaching  of  the  slave  to  read  or  write.  When  you  can  point 
to  any  such  laws  in  reference  to  the  beasts  of  the  field,  then  I 
may  consent  to  argue  the  manhood  of  the  slave.  When  the 
dogs  in  your  streets,  when  the  fowls  in  the  air,  when  the  cattle 
on  your  hills,  when  the  fish  of  the  sea,  and  the  reptiles  that 
crawl  shall  be  unable  to  distinguish  the  slave  from  a  brute, 
then  will  I  argue  with  you  that  the  slave  is  a  man. 

"  For  the  present,  it  is  enough  to  affirm  the  equal  manhood 
of  the  negro  race.  Is  it  not  astonishing  that,  while  we  are 
plowing,  planting,  and  reaping,  using  all  kinds  of  mechanical 
tools,  erecting  houses,  constructing  bridges,  building  ships, 
working  in  metals  of  brass,  iron,  copper,  silver,  and  gold ;  that, 
while  we  are  reading,  writing,  and  ciphering,  acting  as  clerks, 
merchants,  and  secretaries,  having  among  us  lawyers,  doctors, 
ministers,  poets,  authors,  editors,  orators,  and  teachers ;  that, 
while  we  are  engaged  in  all  manner  of  enterprises  common  to 
other  men — digging  gold  in  California,  capturing  the  whale  in 
the  Pacific,  feeding  sheep  and  cattle  on  the  hill-side,  living, 
moving,  acting,  thinking,  planning,  living  in  families  as  hus 
bands,  wives,  and  children,  and,  above  all,  confessing  and 
worshiping  the  Christian's  God,  and  looking  hopefully  for  life 
and  immortality  beyond  the  grave — we  are  called  upon  to  prove 
that  we  are  men  ? 

"  Would  you  have  me  argue  that  man  is  entitled  to  liberty  ? 
That  he  is  the  rightful  owner  of  his  own  body  ?  You  have 
already  declared  it.  Must  I  argue  the  wrongfulness  of  slavery  ? 
Is  that  a  question  for  republicans  ?  Is  it  to  be  settled  by  the 
rules  of  logic  and  argumentation,  as  a  matter  beset  with  great 
difficulty,  involving  a  doubtful  application  of  justice,  hard  to  be 
understood  ?  How  should  I  look  to-day  in  the  presence  of 
Americans,  dividing  and  subdividing  a  discourse  to  show  that 
men  have  a  natural  right  to  freedom,  speaking  of  it  relatively 
and  positively,  negatively  and  affirmatively  ?  To  do  so  would 
be  to  make  myself  ridiculous,  and  to  offer  an  insult  to  your 


2IO  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS 

understanding.  There  is  not  a  man  bsneath  the  canopy  of 
heaven  that  does  not  know  that  slavery  is  wrong  for  ///;//. 

"  What !  am  I  to  argue  that  it  is  wrong  to  make  men  brutes, 
to  rob  them  of  their  liberty,  to  work  them  without  wages,  to 
keep  them  ignorant  of  their  relations  to  their  fellowmen,  to 
beat  them  with  sticks,  to  flay  their  flesh  with  the  lash,  to  load 
their  limbs  with  irons,  to  hunt  them  with  dogs,  to  sell  them  at 
auction,  to  sunder  their  families,  to  knock  out  their  teeth,  to 
burn  their  flesh,  to  starve  them  into  obedience  and  submission 
to  their  masters  ?  Must  I  argue  that  a  system,  thus  marked 
with  blood  and  stained  with  pollution,  is  wrong  ?  No ;  I  will 
not.  I  have  better  employment  for  my  time  and  strength  than 
such  arguments  would  imply. 

What,  then,  remains  to  be  argued  ?  Is  it  that  slavery  is  not 
divine ;  that  God  did  not  establish  it ;  that  our  doctors  of  divin 
ity  are  mistaken  ?  There  is  blasphemy  in  the  thought.  That 
which  is  inhuman  cannot  be  divine.  Who  can  reason  on  such 
a  proposition  ?  They  that  can,  may ;  I  cannot.  The  time  for 
such  argument  is  past. 

At  a  time  like  this,  scorching  irony,  not  convincing  argument, 
is  needed.  Oh  !  had  I  the  ability,  and  could  I  reach  the  nation's 
ear,  I  would  to-day  pour  out  a  stream  of  biting  ridicule,  blast 
ing  reproach,  withering  sarcasm,  and  stern  rebuke.  For  it  is 
not  light  that  is  needed,  but  fire ;  it  is  not  the  gentle  shower, 
but  thunder.  We  need  the  storm,  the  whirlwind,  and  the 
earthquake !  " 

On  August  n,  1852,  the  Free  Soil  convention  met 
at  Pittsburgh  ;  and  Rochester  sent  a  colored  delegate 
who  was  obliged,  both  in  going  and  returning,  to 
take  a  steamboat  between  Buffalo  and  Cleveland,  and 
each  time  to  pass  the  night  on  deck.  On  his  way 
back  he  tried  to  get  breakfast  in  the  cabin  ;  but  his 
chair  was  pulled  out  from  under  him  by  the  captain, 
who  had  already  collected  the  full  fare  for  berth  and 
meal  and  would  refund  nothing.  The  train  for 


"THE  MAN  WHO  is  RIGHT  is  A  MAJORITY.        211 

Pittsburgh  stopped  for  dinner  at  a  hotel  where  he  was 
not  allowed  to  eat,  on  which  many  of  the  other  dele 
gates  rose  from  the  table  and  refused  to  return.  On 
their  wray  back  not  one  of  them  entered  the  hall — 
dinner  had  been  prepared  for  three  hundred  guests, 
but  it  was  left  on  the  landlord's  hands. 

One  of  the  first  steps  taken  in  the  convention  was 
to  make  Douglass  a  secretary  by  acclamation;  and  no 
sooner  did  he  enter  the  hall  than  he  was  invited  to 
speak  by  so  many  enthusiastic  voices,  that  the  white 
man,  who  had  the  floor,  was  obliged  to  surrender  it 
at  once  to  his  dusky  superior.  The  latter  was  dressed 
like  Daniel  Webster — in  white  trowsers  and  a  blue 
coat  with  brass  buttons,  "  indicative,"  says  an 
unfriendly  reporter,  "of  the  bronze  in  his  face." 
There  was  a  great  deal  more  of  iron  in  his  blood  than 
in  Webster's  that  summer.  There  he  stood,  holding 
in  his  hand  a  pamphlet,  by  Gerrit  Smith,  which  he 
was  about  to  recommend  to  his  audience,  taken,  as  he 
said,  wholly  by  surprise,  but  bringing  down  the 
house  repeatedly,  as  he  spoke  thus  : 

"  I  am,  of  course,  for  circumscribing  and  damaging  slavery 
in  every  way.  But  my  motto  is  extermination."  ..."  The 
slave-holders  not  only  forfeit  their  right  to  liberty,  but  to  life 
itself.  The  earth  is  God's ;  and  it  ought  to  be  covered  with 
righteousness,  not  slavery." 

Of  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill  he  said,  suiting  the  action 
to  the  word  : 

"  It  is  too  bad  to  be  repealed,  a  law  fit  only  to  be  trampled 
under  foot.  The  only  way  to  make  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law  a 
dead  letter  is  to  make  half  a  dozen  or  more  dead  kidnappers." 
..."  The  man  who  takes  the  office  of  a  bloodhound  ought  to 
be  treated  as  a  bloodhound  ;  and  I  believe  that  the  lines  of 


212  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

eternal  justice  are  sometimes  so  obliterated  that  it  is  necessary 
to  revive  them  by  deepening  their  traces  with  the  blood  of  a 
tyrant."  ..."  This  vile,  infernal  law  does  not  interfere  with 
singing  of  psalms,  or  anything  of  that  kind,  but  with  the 
weightier  matters  of  the  law,  judgment,  mercy,  and  faith."  .  .  . 
"  Had  it  been  a  law  to  strike  at  baptism,  for  instance,  it  would 
have  been  denounced  from  a  thousand  pulpits ;  and  woe  to  the 
politician  who  did  not  come  to  the  rescue."  ..."  It  has  been 
said  that  this  law  is  constitutional.  If  it  were,  it  would  be 
equally  the  legitimate  sphere  of  government  to  repeal  it.  I  am 
proud  to  be  one  of  the  disciples  of  Gerrit  Smith,  and  this  is  his 
doctrine  ;  and  he  only  utters  what  all  law  writers  have  said, 
who  have  risen  to  any  eminence.  Human  government  is  for 
the  protection  of  rights,  and  not  for  the  destruction  of  rights. 
Suppose  you  and  I  made  a  deed  to  give  away  two  or  three 
acres  of  blue  sky,  would  the  sky  fall  ?  "  .  .  .  "  The  binding 
quality  of  law  is  its  reasonableness.  I  am  safe,  therefore,  in 
saying  that  slavery  cannot  be  legalized."  ..."  You  are  about 
to  have  a  party ;  but  I  hope  not  such  a  party  as  will  gather  up 
the  votes  here  and  there,  in  order  to  be  swallowed  up  at  a 
meal  by  the  great  parties."  ..."  I  want  to  be  always  inde 
pendent,  and  not  hurried  to  and  fro  into  the  ranks  of  Whigs 
and  Democrats.  It  has  been  said  that  we  ought  to  take  the 
position  of  the  greatest  number  of  voters.  That  is  wrong.  It 
was  said,  in  1848,  that  Martin  Van  Buren  would  carry  a  strong 
vote  in  New  York.  He  did,  but  he  almost  ruined  us.  He 
merely  looked  into  the  pig-pen  to  see  how  the  animal  grew, 
but  the  table  was  the  final  prospect  he  had  in  view.  He 
regarded  the  colored  population  as  fatlings  to  be  devoured. 
Numbers  should  not  be  looked  to  so  much  as  right.  The  man 
who  is  right  is  a  majority.  We,  who  have  God  and  conscience 
on  our  side,  have  a  majority  against  the  universe." 

It  will  be  noticed  that  this  speech  contains  an  idea 
which  was  also  put  into  the  words,  "  One  with  God 
is  a  majority."  In  both  forms  it  was,  I  think,  original 
with  Mr.  Douglass. 


"  THE    MAN    WHO    IS    RIGHT    IS    A    MAJORITY."        213 

He  is  said  to  have  made  "  The  one  aggressive 
speech  in  the  convention  ;  "  but  it  is  to  be  remembered 
that  Gerrit  Smith  also  advocated  resisting  the  wicked 
law  by  force.  The  suggestion  of  this  veteran  of  the 
war  against  slavery,  in  favor  of  declaring  that 
political  rights  are  "  irrespective  of  sex  or  color," 
was  not  incorporated  in  the  platform  ;  but  the  con 
vention  did  agree  that  Christianity  and  humanity 
alike  demanded  the  abolition  of  slavery.  Of  the 
Fugitive  Slave  Bill  they  spoke  thus,  We  "  demand 
its  immediate  and  total  repeal,"  and  "  We  deny  its 
binding  force."  The  motto  adopted  for  the  cam 
paign  was,  "  Free  Soil,  Free  Speech,  Free  Labor, 
Free  Men."  It  was  in  full  conformity  with  these 
principles  that  Hale  was  nominated  for  President, 
and  Julian  for  Vice-President,  without  opposition  ; 
and  the  men  were  worthy  of  the  cause. 

Such  a  nomination  for  President,  and  such  a  plat 
form,  were  too  good  to  be  popular  in  1852.  Neither 
the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  nor  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin," 
could  overcome  the  determination  of  the  North  to 
make  every  sacrifice  then  demanded  for  the  preserva 
tion  of  the  Union.  The  Democrats,  who  had  bolted 
four  years  before,  now  went  back  so  generally  that 
New  York  gave  Hale  but  little  more  than  one-fifth  as 
many  votes  as  had  been  given  to  Van  Buren.  The 
Whigs  stood  firmer,  but  even  in  New  England  the 
Free  Soil  vote  was  less  in  1852  than  in  1848.  The 
sum  total  of  290,000,  obtained  by  Van  Buren,  shrank 
to  156,000,  which  was  only  about  five  per  cent,  of  the 
whole  number  of  votes.  The  little  band  of  anti- 
slavery  Congressmen  did,  however,  receive  some 
important  accessions  ;  and  among  them  was  Gerrit 


214  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Smith,  who  owed  his  election  very  largely  to  the 
efforts  of  the  Rochester  editor.  The  latter's  relations 
with  Garrison  were  still  friendly  enough  for  them  to 
appear  together  as  speakers,  at  the  meeting  held  at 
Syracuse,  October  i,  1852,  with  Gerrit  Smith  in  the 
chair,  to  commemorate  the  rescue,  one  year  previous, 
of  a  fugitive  slave  named  Jerry  McHenry.  Rev.  S. 
J.  May  has  given,  in  his  "  Recollections  of  the  Anti- 
Slavery  Conflict,"  a  vivid  account  of  the  exploit,  in 
which  he  and  Gerrit  Smith  took  prominent  parts. 
The  celebration  in  1852  was  in  the  engine-house,  just 
completed  by  the  New  York  Central  Railroad. 

What  Douglass  said  about  Garrison  among  his 
opponents,  on  May  n,  1853,  has  been  given  in  the 
last  chapter  ;  and  on  that  same  day  we  find  him  once 
more  on  the  platform  of  the  A.  A.  S.  S.,  in  New  York 
City.  Henry  Ward  Beecher  said  there,  that  he  had 
rather  wait  seventy-five  years  for  slavery  to  be 
abolished  by  Christianity,  than  have  emancipation 
decreed  in  only  fifty  years  from  mere  motives  of  a 
selfish  commercial  interest.  The  next  speaker  was 
Douglass,  and  he  began  by  saying  that,  "  If  the 
reverend  gentleman  had  worked  on  plantations 
where  I  have  been,  he  would  have  met  with  overseers 
who  would  have  whipped  him  in  five  minutes  out  of 
all  his  willingness  to  wait  for  liberty."  The  boldness 
of  this  rebuke  is  all  the  more  remarkable,  because  the 
man  who  gave  it  continued  in  these  words  : 

"  No  colored  man  with  any  nervous  sensibility  can  stand 
before  an  American  audience,  without  an  intense  and  painful 
sense  of  the  disadvantages  imposed  by  his  color.  He  feels  little 
borne  up  by  the  brotherly  sympathy  and  generous  enthusiasm 
which  give  wings  to  the  eloquence  and  stiength  to  the  hearts  of 


"THE  MAN  WHO  is  RIGHT  is  A  MAJORITY.        215 

other  men,  who  advocate  other  and  more  popular  causes.  The 
ground  which  a  colored  man  occupies  in  this  country  is,  every 
inch  of  it,  sternly  disputed.  Sir,  were  I  a  white  man  speaking 
for  the  rights  of  white  men,  I  would  in  this  country  have  a 
smooth  sea  and  a  fair  wind.  It  is  perhaps  creditable  to  the 
American  people  (and  I  am  not  the  man  to  detract  from  their 
credit),  that  they  listen  eagerly  to  the  report  of  wrongs  endured 
by  distant  nations.  The  Hungarian,  the  Italian,  the  Irishman, 
the  Jew  and  Gentile,  all  find  in  this  goodly  land  a  home ;  and 
when  any  of  them  or  all  of  them  desire  to  speak,  they  find 
willing  ears,  warm  hearts,  and  open  hands.  For  these  people, 
the  American  people  have  principles  of  justice,  maxims  of 
mercy,  sentiments  of  religion,  and  feelings  of  brotherhood  in 
abundance.  But  for  my  poor  people  (alas,  how  poor),  enslaved, 
scourged,  blasted,  overwhelmed,  and  ruined,  it  would  appear 
that  America  had  neither  justice,  mercy,  nor  religion.  She  has 
no  scales  in  which  to  weigh  our  wrongs,  and  no  standard  by 
which  to  measure  our  rights.  Just  here  lies  the  grand  difficulty 
of  the  colored  man's  cause.  It  is  found  in  the  fact  that  we  may 
not  avail  ourselves  of  the  just  force  of  admitted  American  princi 
ples.  If  I  do  not  misinterpret  the  feelings  and  philosophy  of 
my  white  fellow-countrymen  generally,  they  wish  us  to  under 
stand  distinctly  and  fully,  that  they  have  no  other  use  for  us 
whatever  than  to  coin  dollars  out  of  our  blood.  Our  position 
here  is  anomalous,  unequal,  and  extraordinary.  It  is  a  position 
to  which  the  most  courageous  of  our  race  cannot  look  without 
deep  concern.  Sir,  we  are  a  hopeful  people,  and  in  this  we  are 
fortunate ;  but  for  this  trait  of  our  character  we  should  have, 
long  before  this  seemingly  unpropitious  hour,  sunk  down  under 
a  sense  of  utter  despair.  Look  at  it,  sir,  here  upon  the  soil  of 
our  birth,  in  a  country  which  has  known  us  for  two  centuries, 
among  people  who  did  not  wait  for  us  to  seek  them,  but  who 
sought  and  found  us,  and  brought  us  to  their  own  chosen  land,  a 
people  for  whom  we  have  performed  the  humblest  services,  and 
whose  greatest  comforts  and  luxuries  have  been  won  from  the 
soil  by  our  sable  and  sinewy  arms.  I  say,  sir,  among  such  a 
people  and  with  such  obvious  recommendations  to  favor,  we 


2l6  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

are  far  less  esteemed  than  the  veriest  stranger  and  sojourner. 
Aliens  are  we  in  our  native  land.  The  fundamental  princi 
ples  of  the  Republic,  to  which  the  humblest  white  man,  whether 
born  here  or  elsewhere,  may  appeal  with  confidence  in  the  hope 
of  awakening  a  favorable  response,  are  held  inapplicable  to  us. 
The  glorious  doctrines  of  your  Revolutionary  fathers,  and  the 
more  glorious  teachings  of  the  Son  of  God  are  construed  and 
applied  against  us.  We  are  literally  scourged  beyond  the 
beneficent  range  of  both  authorities — human  and  divine.  We 
plead  for  our  rights  in  the  name  of  the  immortal  Declaration  of 
Independence  and  of  the  written  Constitution  of  government; 
and  we  are  answered  with  imprecations  and  curses.  In  the 
sacred  name  of  Jesus  we  beg  for  mercy;  and  the  slave-whip,  red 
with  blood,  cracks  over  us  in  mockery.  We  invoke  the  aid  of 
the  minister  of  Him  who  came  '  to  preach  deliverance  to  the 
captive,'  and  to  set  at  liberty  them  that  are  bound,  and  from  the 
loftiest  summits  of  this  ministry  comes  the  inhuman  and  blasphe 
mous  response,  saying,  if  one  prayer  would  move  the  Almighty 
arm  in  mercy  to  break  our  galling  chains,  that  prayer  would  be 
withheld.  We  cry  for  help  to  humanity,  a  common  humanity  ; 
and  here,  too,  we  are  repulsed.  American  humanity  hates  us, 
scorns  us,  disowns  and  denies  in  a  thousand  ways  our  very  per 
sonality.  The  outspread  wing  of  American  Christianity,  appar 
ently  broad  enough  to  give  shelter  to  a  perishing  world,  refuses 
to  cover  us.  To  us  its  bones  are  brass,  and  its  feathers  iron. 
In  running  thither  for  succor  and  shelter,  we  have  only  fled  from 
the  hungry  bloodhound  to  the  devouring  wolf,  from  a  corrupt 
and  selfish  world  to  a  hollow  and  hypocritical  church." 

This  passage  was  selected  by  the  author  as  his  con 
tribution  to  "  Autographs  for  Freedom,"  Volume  ii., 
1854.  Miss  Griffiths  included  in  this  year's  collection 
a  speech  of  Theodore  Parker's,  and  also  the  poem  on 
"  Freedom,"  by  Emerson.  Each  selection  was 
accompanied  by  a  fac-simile  of  the  signature,  and 
the  book  was  handsomely  bound  and  printed. 


"  THE    MAN    WHO    IS    RIGHT    IS    A    MAJORITY."        217 

Among  other  portions  of  the  address  by  Douglass, 
on  May  n,  1853,  are  these  : 

"  I  have  thus  briefly  given  my  view  of  one  aspect  of  the 
present  condition  and  future  prospects  of  the  colored  people  of 
the  United  States.  And  what  I  have  said  is  far  from  encourag 
ing  to  my  afflicted  people.  I  have  seen  the  cloud  gather  upon 
the  sable  brows  of  some  who  "hear  me.  I  confess  the  case 
looks  black  enough.  Sir,  I  am  not  a  hopeful  man.  I  think  I 
am  apt  even  to  undercalculate  the  benefits  of  the  future.  Yet, 
sir,  in  this  seemingly  desperate  case,  I  do  not  despair  for  my 
people.  There  is  a  bright  side  to  almost  every  picture  of  this 
kind  ;  and  ours  is  no  exception  to  the  general  rule.  If  the 
influences  against  us  are  strong,  those  for  us  are  also  strong. 
But  the  inquiry,  will  our  enemies  prevail  in  the  execution  of 
their  designs  ?  In  my  God  and  in  my  soul  I  believe  they  will 
not.  Let  us  look  at  the  first  object  sought  for  by  the  slavery 
party  of  the  country,  viz.,  the  suppression  of  anti-slavery  dis 
cussion.  They  desire  to  suppress  discussion  on  this  subject, 
with  a  view  to  the  peace  of  the  slave-holder  and  the  security  of 
slavery.  Now,  sir,  neither  the  principal  nor  the  subordinate 
objects  here  declared,  can  be  at  all  gained  by  the  slave-power, 
and  for  this  reason  :  it  involves  the  proposition  to  padlock  the 
lips  of  the  whites,  in  order  to  secure  the  fetters  on  the  limbs  of 
the  blacks.  The  right  of  speech,  precious  and  priceless,  can 
not,  will  not,  be  surrendered  to  slavery.  Its  suppression  is 
asked  for,  as  I  have  said,  to  give  peace  and  security  to  slave 
holders.  Sir,  that  thing  cannot  be  done.  God  has  interposed 
an  insuperable  obstacle  to  any  such  result.  '  There  can  be  no 
peace/  saith  my  God,  '  to  the  wicked.'  Suppose  it  were  pos 
sible  to  put  down  this  discussion,  what  would  it  avail  the  guilty 
slave-holder,  pillowed  as  he  is  upon  the  heaving  bosoms  of 
ruined  souls  ?  He  could  not  have  a  peaceful  spirit.  If  every 
anti-slavery  tongue  in  the  nation  were  silent,  every  anti-slavery 
organization  dissolved,  every  anti-slavery  press  demolished, 
every  anti-slavery  periodical,  paper,  book,  pamphlet,  or  what  not, 
were  searched  out,  gathered  together,  deliberately  burned  to 


2l8  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

ashes,  and  their  ashes  given  to  the  four  winds  of  heaven,  still, 
still  the  slave-holder  could  have  '  no  peace.'  In  every  pulsation 
of  his  heart,  in  every  throb  of  his  life,  in  every  glance  of  his  eye, 
in  the  breeze  that  soothes,  and  in  the  thunder  that  startles, 
would 'be  waked  up  an  accuser,  whose  cause  is,  'Thou  art 
verily  guilty  concerning  thy  brother.'  .  .  . 

"  Slavery  has  no  means  within  itself  of  perpetuation  or  per 
manence.  It  is  a  huge  lie.  It  is  of  the  devil,  and  will  go  to  its 
place.  It  is  against  nature,  against  progress,  against  improve 
ment,  and  against  the  government  of  God.  It  cannot  stand.  It 
has  an  enemy  in  every  bar  of  railroad  iron,  in  every  electric 
wire,  in  every  improvement  in  navigation,  in  the  growing  inter 
course  of  nations,  in  cheap  postage,  in  the  relaxation  of  tariffs, 
in  common  schools,  in  the  progress  of  education,  the  spread  of 
knowledge,  in  the  steam  engine,  and  in  the  World's  Fair,  now 
about  to  assemble  in  New  York,  and  in  everything  that  will  be 
exhibited  there. 

"  About  making  slavery  respectable  in  the  North,  laws  have 
been  made  to  accomplish  just  that  thing;  the  law  of  1850  and 
the  law  of  1793.  And  those  laws,  instead  of  getting  respect 
for  slavey,  have  begot  distrust  and  abhorrence.  Congress 
might  pass  fugitive  slave  laws  every  day  in  the  year,  for  all 
time,  if  each  one  should  be  followed  by  such  publications  as 
'  Uncle  Tom  '  and  the  '  Key.'  It  is  not  in  the  power  of  human 
law  to  make  men  entirely  forget  that  the  slave  is  a  man.  The 
freeman  of  the  North  can  never  be  brought  to  look  with  the 
same  feeling  upon  a  man  escaping  from  his  claimants  as  upon 
a  horse  running  from  his  owner.  The  slave  is  a  man,  and  no 
slave.  Now,  sir,  I  had  more  to  say  on  the  encouraging  aspects 
of  the  times,  but  the  time  fails  me,  I  will  only  say  in  conclu 
sion,  greater  is  He  that  is  for  us,  than  they  that  are  against 
us  ;  and  though  labor  and  peril  beset  the  anti-slavery  move 
ments,  so  sure  as  that  a  God  of  mercy  and  justice  is  enthroned 
above  all  created  things,  so  sure  will  that  cause  gloriously 
triumph." 

This  meeting  was  as  remarkable  for  tranquillity  as 


"THE  MAN  WHO  is  RIGHT  is  A  MAJORITY."      219 

that  in  1850  had  been  for  disturbance.  The  anti- 
slavery  cause  was  gaining  in  favor,  though  still  under 
the  ecclesiastical  ban.  Douglass  set  himself,  in  his 
paper,  decidedly  against  giving  any  unnecessary  ex 
cuse  for  such  censures  ;  but  when  he  found  himself 
branded  as  an  infidel,  which  was  the  case  down  to  the 
outbreak  of  the  war,  he  said  :  "  If  the  glory  of  Ameri 
can  emancipation  is  to  be  given  to  infidels,  it  will  be 
a  killing  sentence  against  the  American  Church." 
The  best  words  I  know  of  on  this  subject,  however, 
were  those  which  Lucy  Stone,  in  her  speech  this  very 
day,  quoted  from  Sally  Holley  :  "  Let  them  call  us 
infidels,  if  they  please  ;  but,  oh  !  don't  let  them  call 
themselves  Christians." 

The  following  description  of  the  oratorical  power 
of  Douglass  at  this  time  was  given  by  another  colored 
man,  Professor  \V.  J.  Wilson,  in  "  Autographs  for 
Freedom:" 

"  In  his  very  look,  his  gesture,  his  whole  manner,  there  is  so 
much  of  genuine,  earnest  eloquence,  that  they  leave  no  time  for 
reflection.  Now  you  are  reminded  of  one  rushing  down  some 
fearful  steep,  bidding  you  follow;  now  of  some  delightful 
stream,  still  beckoning  you  onward.  In  either  case,  no  matter 
what  your  prepossessions  or  oppositions,  you,  for  the  moment 
at  least,  forget  the  justness  or  unjustness  of  his  cause,  and 
obey  the  summons ;  and  loath,  if  at  all,  you  return  to  your 
former  post.  Not  always,  however,  is  he  successful  in  retain 
ing  you.  Giddy  as  you  may  be  with  the  descent  you  have 
made,  delighted  as  you  are  with  the  pleasure  afforded,  with  the 
Elysium  to  which  he  has  wafted  you,  you  return  too  often  dis 
satisfied  with  his  and  your  own  impetuosity  and  want  of  firm 
ness.  You  feel  that  you  had  only  a  dream,  a  pastime — not  a 
reality.  This  great  power  of  momentary  captivation  consists 
in  his  eloquence  of  manner,  his  just  appreciation  of  words.  In 


220  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

listening  to  him,  your  whole  soul  is  fired,  every  nerve  strung, 
every  passion  inflated,  and  every  faculty  you  possess  ready  to 
perform  at  a  moment's  bidding;  You  stop  not  to  ask  why 
or  wherefore.  Tis  a  unison  of  mighty  yet  harmonious  sounds 
that  play  upon  your  imagination ;  and  you  give  yourself  up  for 
a  time  to  their  irresistible  charm.  At  last,  the  cataract  which 
roared  around  you  is  hushed,  the  tornado  is  passed,  and  you 
find  yourself  sitting  upon  a  bank  (at  whose  base  roll  but  tranquil 
waters),  quietly  asking  yourself,  why,  amid  such  a  display  of 
power,  no  greater  effect  had  really  been  produced.  After  all,  it 
must  be  admitted  there  is  a  power  in  Mr.  Douglass  rarely  to 
be  found  in  any  other  man." 

Early  in  1853  he  published  in  his  own  paper  a 
highly  wrought  story,  which  had  already  appeared 
in  "Autographs  for  Freedom,"  entitled  "The  Heroic 
Slave."  It  is  based  on  actual  adventures  of  Madison 
Washington,  who  set  himself  free  by  his  own  courage 
some  ten  years  before. 

The  colored  national  convention,  which  met  that 
year  in  Rochester,  on  July  6,  adopted  an  address, 
written  by  their  champion,  and  containing  this  pas 
sage  :  "  We  are,  and  by  right  we  ought  to  be  Ameri 
can  citizens.  We  claim  this  right  ;  and  we  claim  all 
the  rights,  privileges,  and  duties  which  properly  attach 
to  it."  A  resolution  was  also  passed  in  favor  of 
establishing  an  -Industrial  College,  with  an  agricul 
tural  professor,  and  instructors  "  To  superintend  the 
practical  application  of  natural  philosophy  to  general 
smithing,  turning,  and  cabinet  making." 

The  author  of  this  plan  had  written,  four  months 
before,  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Stowe,  which  may  be  found 
in  his  "Life  and  Times"  (pp.  323-327).  He  had 
been  invited  by  her  to  a  visit  at  her  house,  where  he 


"THE  MAN  WHO  is  RIGHT  is  A  MAJORITY.        221 

met  a  little  girl  who  must,  he  thinks,  have  been  the 
model  for  Eva  in  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  ;"  and  during 
the  interview  he  persuaded  her  to  promise  to  use 
money,  which  she  hoped  to  collect  in  Europe  for  the 
benefit  of  his  race,  in  establishing  what  he  calls,  "  A 
college  \vhere  colored  youth  can  be  instructed  to  use 
their  hands  as  well  as  their  heads  ;  where  they  can 
be  put  in  possession  of  the  means  of  getting  a  liv 
ing."  One  of  his  editorials,  on  March  18,  was  headed 
"  Make  your  Sons  Mechanics  and  Farmers,  not  Wait 
ers,  Porters,  and  Barbers."  One  passage,  which  may 
still  be  recommended  to  the  attention  of  all  men  and 
women  who  send  their  children  to  our  public  schools, 
runs  thus:  "It  is  cruel,  unnatural,  brutal,  and  scand 
alous  for  parents  to  cast  their  offspring  upon  a  selfish 
world  without  using  every  means  in  their  power  to 
give  them  useful  trades."  Our  public  schools  are 
not  yet  fully  up  to  the  suggestions  which  he  made 
nearly  forty  years  ago,  when  he  said  in  the  number  of 
his  paper  just  referred  to,  "  The  education  of  the 
hands  must  precede  that  of  the  head." 

It  is  also  pleasant  to  find  that  he  spoke  strongly  in 
favor  of  female  compositors,  in  the  Woman's  Rights 
Convention,  held  in  Rochester,  November  30  and 
December  i,  1853,  presided  over  by  Rev.  S.  J.  May, 
and  attended  by  Rev.  W.  H.  Channing,  Rev.  Antoin 
ette  L.  Brown,  Mrs.  Stanton,  Mrs.  Bloomer,  Mrs.  Lucy 
N.  Colman,  and  Miss  Anthony.  He  also  said,  "Some 
one  whispers  in  my  ear,  that  as  teachers,  women  get 
one-fourth  the  pay  men  do,  while  a  girl's  tuition  is 
the  same  as  a  boy's." 

Mrs.  Colman,  who  did  good  work  for  abolitionism 
as  well  as  for  woman's  rights,  has  kindly  furnished 


222  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

me  with  a  letter  of  recollections,  which  has  direct  re 
ference  to  this  period  : 

"  My  intimate  acquaintance  with  Frederick  Douglass  com 
menced  in  1853;  and,  if  we  except  the  following  year,  1854, 
continued  until  the  close  of  the  war.  Mr.  Douglass  was  entirely 
disfellowshiped  by  the  Garrisonian  party  soon  after  his  return 
from  England  ;  the  establishing  of  a  paper  published  and  edited 
by  him,  somehow,  did  not  meet  with  Mr.  Garrison's  approval ; 
and  never  did  any  party  follow  its  leader  more  closely  than  the 
Garrisonians  followed  him.  Mr.  Garrison  did  not  allow  a  dif 
ference  of  opinion ;  in  his  eyes  such  difference  was  not  possible 
in  a  true  Abolitionist.  The  bitterness  engendered  by  this 
division  had  a  marked  effect  upon  Mr.  Douglass's  disposition ; 
he  is  a  man  of  very  strong  feeling ;  and  he  had  been  petted  and 
almost  owned  by  the  prominent  members  of  that  class  of  Abol 
itionists.  To  find  himself  treated  as  though  he  had  been  false 
to  his  race,  because  he  had  broken  loose  from  leading  strings, 
and  chose  to  work  in  his  own  way,  was  very  hard ;  but  he  was 
equal  to  the  situation,  though  his  spirit  was  somewhat  em 
bittered. 

"  There  was  in  one  of  those  years,  when  the  Unitarian  Society 
in  Rochester  was  without  a  settled  pastor,  an  attempt  to  hold 
a  series  of  Sunday  meetings  by  one  of  the  agents  of  the  Aboli 
tionists.  Mr.  Douglass  did  not  attend  these  Sunday  meetings ; 
and  we  all  knew  that  his  absence  was  a  great  loss,  as  his  popu 
larity  was  such,  that  his  presence,  if  advertised,  would  always 
insure  a  large  audience  ;  but  he  had  a  personal  grievance  with 
the  getter-up  of  these  meetings,  and  was  in  no  mood  to  go.  A 
murder  had  been  committed  some  little  time  previous  ;  and 
the  guilty  man  (not  a  man  in  age),  was  condemned  to  the 
gallows.  Some  of  us,  wholly  opposed  to  capital  punishment, 
concluded  to  call  a  public  meeting,  and  try  to  act  upon  the 
people  by  the  presence  of  extenuating  circumstances,  which 
were  many,  so  as  to  get  our  petition,  for  a  change  to  imprison 
ment  for  life,  largely  signed.  I  went  to  Mr.  Douglass,  and  suc 
ceeded  in  getting  his  name  to  the  call,  and  a  promise  that  he 


"  THE    MAN    WHO    IS    RIGHT    IS    A    MAJORITY."        223 

would  attend.  Our  advertisement  was  followed  by  a  call  of  the 
largest  kind  to  the  people  to  go  and  take  the  meeting  from  the 
callers,  and  prevent  any  presentation  of  sympathy  with  a 
murderer.  We,  the  callers  of  the  meeting,  came  together  at 
the  hour  and  succeeded  in  appointing  the  officers,  making  Mr. 
Douglass  president,  when  the  house  filled  with  a  mob  of  men 
so  violent  that  it  seemed  as  though  there  might  be  murder 
there.  Frederick  Douglass  then  and  there  showed  himself  a 
man  of  almost  superhuman  power.  His  loud  but  melodious 
voice  rose  above  the  wild  howl  of  those  enraged  men,  and 
quieted  them  for  some  few  moments  (they  would  hear  no  other 
one),  though  they  frequently  threw  at  him  the  most  insulting 
epithets ;  but  they  had  come  to  break  up  the  meeting  and  they 
succeeded.  The  Mayor,  instead  of  protecting  the  meeting, 
ordered  the  lights  in  the  hall  put  out  and  the  meeting  proper 
to  disperse.  Thus  was  free  speech  protected  in  those  pro- 
slavery  days  ;  but  good  came  to  Mr.  Douglass  through  that 
disgraceful  mob.  His  name  (that  had  been  ignored  for  some 
years)  found  its  way  into  the  'Liberator'  and  'Anti-Slavery 
Standard  '  in  words  that  gave  him  true  honor;  and  many  old 
friends  forgot  their  animosity  and  greeted  him  as  of  old. 

"  Mr.  Douglass  had  a  fund  of  humor  that,  whatever  the 
emergency,  he  could  call  upon ;  and  he  had  a  kind  of  venom  so 
cruel,  that  I  would  feel  for  my  bitterest  enemy  that  was  being 
stung  by  it. 

"  He  was  once  invited  to  speak  in  a  village  west  of  Rochester, 
the  place  a  Baptist  church.  After  he  had  ascended  the  pulpit, 
the  deacon  of  the  church  went  to  him  and  told  him  '  There  was 
an  unpleasant  rumor  abroad  in  that  region  concerning  him, 
that  he  ought  to  clear  up.'  Mr.  Douglass  asked  to  be  informed 
what  it  was,  and  the  deacon  said  '  It  is  that  you  have  married  a 
white  wife  ! '  So  when  Mr.  Douglass  rose,  he  repeated  what  the 
deacon  had  told  him  and  proceeded  to  '  clear  it  up.'  He  said 
he  had  been  invited  to  give  an  anti-slavery  lecture  there,  and 
had  come  prepared  to  do  so  ;  and  he  could  not  see  in  what  way 
the  color  of  his  wife  affected  the  subject.  If  his  wife  had  chosen 
to  marry  him,  he  being  colored,  it  was  her  business.  The 


224  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

audience  at  this  point  were  very  sure  that  they  would  hear  the 
confession  from  his  own  lips,  that  his  wife  was  white.  They 
were  all  excitement.  '  Now,'  said  Mr.  Douglass,  '  If  my  wife 
could  see,  she  could  not  help  knowing  that  I  was  not  a  white 
man  ;  and  yet  she  married  me.  Pray  tell  me  what  has  her 
color  to  do  with  a  lecture  against  slavery?  '  So  he  tantalized 
his  audience  with  the  subject  till  they  supposed  his  next  utter 
ance  would  be  an  announcement  that  his  wife  was  white,  and 
then  he  would  return  to  the  subject  and  argue  it  out  again, 
showing  that  his  color,  or  that  of  his  wife,  had  nothing  to  do 
with  the  subject  that  he  came  to  discuss.  At  length,  after  the 
large  audience  wearied  of  the  delay,  Mr.  Douglass  decided  that 
the  color  of  his  wife  was  not  the  business  of  the  meeting,  and 
dropped  it  without  telling  them  ;  and  so  they  supposed  his  wife 
was  white.  The  truth  was,  she  was  black  as  night ;  but  the 
audience  forgot  to  be  angry  as  they  listened  to  his  lecture,  so 
thrilling,  so  grand  that  even  our  Wendell  Phillips,  silver- 
tongued  and  graceful  beyond  description,  'the  World's  Orator/ 
could  not  more  than  equal  it. 

"  I  have  heard  Mr.  Douglass  tell  a  story  in  which  his  color 
was  no  longer  of  any  use.  Said  he,  '  I  used  to  find  myself 
favored  with  a  double  seat  in  the  cars,  very  convenient  when 
one  is  traveling  at  night ;  but  recently  I  had  an  all-night  ride 
before  me,  and  prepared  my  bag  for  a  pillow,  covered  my  head 
with  my  shawl,  and  was  about  falling  to  sleep  ;  when  some  one 
shook  me,  saying  at  the  same  time,  "  Move  along  and  give  me  a 
seat."  I  roused  myself,  took  my  cap  as  well  as  my  shawl  from 
my  head,  so  that  my  hair  would  be  observable,  thinking  that 
would  be  sufficient  to  insure  me  my  resting  place  ;  but  a  more 
severe  shaking  came  and  a  peremptory  command  to  move  and 
give  up  one  seat.  Then  I  said  very  meekly  '  I  am  a  nigger.' 

"  Go  to with  your  nigger,  move  along  and  give  me  a  seat !  " 

'  So,'  said  he,  '  My  color  is  no  longer  of  any  use.'  " 

Another  lady  answered  my  questions  thus  : 

"  I  wish  I  had  more  facts  of  Frederick  Douglass's  life  than  I 


"THE  MAN  WHO  is  RIGHT  is  A  MAJORITY."      225 

have.  I  knew  him  when  he  had  just  escaped  from  slavery,  in 
Syracuse,  where  he  first  attracted  immensely  as  a  speaker.  He 
was  full  of  wit,  humor,  and  satire,  somewhat  bitter  at  times,  of 
commanding  presence,  and  a  magnificent  voice,  unsurpassed  as 
an  orator,  especially  when  a  little  bit  angry.  '  One  with  God  is 
a  majority,'  was  said  by  him  after  a  taunt  from  an  opponent 
on  the  weakness  of  numbers  and  power  of  the  Abolitionists.  You 
know  he  went  to  England,  and  was  bought  and  presented  to 
himself  by  the  English  people.  He  was  converted  from  the 
Garrisonians  to  the  political  party  of  anti-slavery  by  Gerrit 
Smith,  who  was  always  a  firm  friend.  His  recent  autobio 
graphy  will  give  you  all  the  information  there  is  about  his  public 
career,  written  in  excellent  taste.  The  paper  you  speak  of  I 
tried  to  subscribe  for,  but,  owing  to  bad  arrangements  in  the 
office,  did  not  succeed.  In  fact,  he  was  not  methodical,  or  very 
practical.  Susan  B.  Anthony  used  to  say, '  He  had  a  great  deal 
of  uncommon  sense,  but  his  wife  more  than  her  share  of  common 
sense.'  Nothing  that  he  has  ever  done  or  said  is  more  admir 
able  than  the  respect  he  always  showed  her,  and  his  undeviating 
exaction  of  the  same  from  others.  She  was  an  excellent 
house-wife  and  manager.  I  have  been  to  his  house  in  Roch 
ester,  saw  her  and  the  children.  They  are  more  like  their 
mother  as  I  remember  them.  The  daughter,  Rose,  married  a 
fugitive  slave.  A  younger  daughter  died  broken  hearted  during 
the  John  Brown  raid;  her  father  being  obliged  to  fly  to  Europe, 
you  remember,  and  Brown  himself,  who  had  been  at  his  house, 
and  to  whom  the  child  had  become  much  attached,  beintr 

o 

hung,  and  the  illustrated  papers  being  scattered  about  so 
excited  the  child,  that  she  drooped  and  died  ;  and  he  had  only 
the  grave  to  look  upon  when  he  returned.  Douglass  is  a  man 
of  great  natural  refinement,  perhaps  from  his  white  father, 
perhaps  from  a  freak  of  nature.  I  think  very  little  of  heredity 
myself.  Certainly  the  best  in  society  and  in  life  was  what  he 
liked  best,  and  was  always  seeking.  I  think  many  colored 
people  did  not  feel  fully  assured  of  his  friendship  to  them,  which 
was  a  great  mistake.  The  wholesome  truths  he  uttered  seemed 
harsh,  but  he  was  and  is  a  true  friend  to  his  race." 


226  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

A  pathetic  circumstance  about  his  child's  grave  is 
mentioned  by  Miss  Holley,  in  the  valuable  letter  from 
which  I  make  another  extract.  The  lines,  there  quoted 
from  Campbell,  are  given  precisely  as  they  were 
afterward  written  out  by  Mr.  Douglass,  who  has 
improved  them  greatly. 

"  Years  went  by,  and  the  next  meeting  I  recall  with  this  heroic 
fugitive  slave,  whose  romantic  fortunes  are  indeed  a  miracle, 
was  in  the  city  of  Rochester.  He  had  a  respectable  residence 
in  spacious  grounds  in  the  country,  near  the  beautiful  Mount 
Hope.  I  called  on  Mr.  D.  and  his  family  whenever  I  visited 
Mount  Hope,  and  well  remember  the  tidiness  and  taste  of  the 
little  parlor,  the  quiet,  handsome  library,  with  its  attractive 
books  and  pictures — his  daughters,  Rosa,  an  intelligent  school 
girl,  and  the  gentle,  darling,  little  Anna,  with  her  winning, 
modest  shyness,  but  happy  to  trust  the  friendly  face  of  the  lady 
who  held  her  small,  soft,  velvety  hand  kindly,  while  talking 
with  her  father  and  mother.  Perhaps  these  were  rare  occa 
sions  to  the  little  girl,  for  we  never  met  any  white  lady  caller ; 
and  the  social  isolation  of  Mr.  Douglass — man  of  genius  as  he 
was,  of  distinguished  presence  and  gracious  manners,  fit  to 
adorn  any  circle — must  have  been  torture.  He  told  us  sadly 
once,  '  I  live  the  life  of  a  hermit  here  in  Rochester.'  Illustrious 
strangers,  like  James  Russell  Lowell  and  Frederika  Bremer, 
traveling  through  Rochester,  always  called  on  Douglass,  but 
Rochester  people  didn't.  He  was  fortunate  in  the  comfort  of 
his  home,  made  so  by  the  nice  and  able  house-keeping  of  Mrs. 
Douglass,  who  kept  an  inviting  table,  and  the  wardrobe  of  her 
family  neat  and  presentable.  She  was  ever  attentive  to  warding 
off  attacks  of  colds  and  rheumatism  with  warm  changes  of  cloth 
ing  for  Mr.  D.,  at  home  and  on  his  travels.  But  the  anti-slavery 
families  of  Rochester,  who  formed,  in  those  days,  a  superior 
and  attractive  circle  (that  included  the  Rev.  Wm.  H.  Channing, 
and  the  new  university  professors),  held  shy  from  incur 
ring  popular  odium  by  asking  a  black  man  to  their  social  even- 


"THE  MAN  WHO  is  RIGHT  is  A  MAJORITY."     227 

ing  parties.  I  remember  when  Hon.  George  Thompson,  of 
England,  was  in  Rochester,  a  round  of  evening  parties  was 
given  in  his  honor.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Wilder  gave  the  most  ele 
gant  one  in  their  large,  handsome  house.  Mr.  Thompson  was 
in  brilliant  mood,  sang  delightful  songs,  told  merry  anec 
dotes,  and  talked  charmingly.  Still,  I  thought  the  company 
incomplete  without  the  presence  of  Frederick  Douglass.  I 
was  ashamed  of  the  stupid  prejudice  that  excluded  him.  A 
lively  young  gentleman  said  to  me,  '  To  have  Douglass  here 
this  evening  might  strangle  the  young  infant  University  to 
death.'  And  yet  the  time  may  come  when  Rochester  will  be 
only  known  as  the  place  where  Frederick  Douglass  once  lived. 
This  color  exclusion  was  keenly  felt  by  so  sensitive  a  nature  as 
F.  D.'s,  admirably  suited  to  enjoy  and  reciprocate  the  genial 
flow  and  glow  of  cultured  society,  by  his  rare  innate  refine 
ment  and  the  glimpses  his  peculiar  experience  had  gained 
from  association  with  our  true  American  noblesse,  who  had 
thrown  all  their  advantages  of  birth,  wealth,  and  social  position 
into  the  scale  of  humanity  against  the  prevalent  spirit  of  caste 
and  prejudice. 

"  Of  these  conspicuously  was  the  '  noblest  name  in  the  Empire 
State,'  Hon.  Gerrit  Smith — that  peerless  philanthropist,  whose 
princely  fortune  was  devoted,  beyond  precedent,  to  the  service 
of  humanity,  as  simple,  transparent  and  unaffectedly  devout  a 
follower  of  the  Christian  precepts  of  human  brotherhood  as 
Count  Tolstoi,  from  whose  table  and  delightful  drawing-room 
Frederick  Douglass  was  never  made  to  feel  the  ban  of  color. 
That  charming  Peterboro'  mansion  dispensed  generous  and 
unique  hospitality — alike  to  the  beauty  and  chivalry  of  the  city 
and  the  State,  and  to  the  lowly  fugitive  slave  and  his  advo 
cates,  who  stood  nowhere  else  on  such  footing  as  in  that 
splendid  domain,  inherited  from  the  partner  of  John  Jacob 
Astor.  Gerrit  Smith  ever  welcomed  Douglass  '  as  a  brother 
beloved.' 

"  So  in  Boston  did  the  highest  and  proudest  in  family  distinc 
tion,  Wendell  Phillips,  condescend  to  him  of  low  estate.  His 
invalid,  but  magnificent-hearted  wife,  a  cousin  of  Copley,  the 


228  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

painter,  precluded  domestic  entertainment.  But  on  every 
steamboat,  in  every  omnibus,  railroad  car,  where  Douglass  was 
tabood,  solely  because  of  color,  there  was  Wendell  Phillips 
ready  to  take  his  seat  beside  his  '  despised  and  rejected ' 
brother,  vastly  to  the  annoyance  of  conductors  and  agents, 
who  couldn't  help  feeling  the  scandal  and  disgrace  of  the 
miserable  colorphobia,  so  pointedly  rebuked.  To  crown  all 
the  rest,  once  in  an  anti-slavery  family — too  poor  to  offer  two 
beds  to  their  guests  of  a  night — Wendell  Phillips  so  far  forgot 
the  hateful  proscription  as  to  share  the  bed  of  Frederick 
Douglass.  Mr.  P.  may  have  had  this  in  his  mind  when  later, 
in  his  exquisite  addresses,  he  used  to  tell  the  anecdote  of 
Washington  making  the  chilled  and  sleepy  negro  servant  of 
Colonel  Pickering,  watching  with  him  in  the  same  tent,  lie 
down  beside  him  and  sleep  out  the  night  under  the  same 
blanket. 

"  I  once  heard  Douglass  in  a  speech  in  Rochester,  in  a 
strain  of  subdued  yet  powerful  eloquence,  say :  '  I  sometimes 
forget  the  color  of  my  skin,  and  remember  that  I  am  a  man. 
I  sometimes  forget  that  I  am  hated  of  men,  and  remember  I 
am  loved  of  God.  Has  the  white  man  religious  aspirations  ? 
So  have  I.  Thoughts  that  wander  through  eternity,  affections 
that  climb  up  and  twine  around  the  Universal  Father.' 

"  While  the^///i  of  Rochester  shrank  from  the  social  equality, 
implied  in  an  invitation  to  its  table,  there  were  households,  like 
Miss  Porter's,  that  keenly  enjoyed  a  chance  call,  or  interview, 
with  one  known  then  to  be  '  a  lion  ;  '  and  its  diverse  members 
would  quickly  assemble  in  the  parlor  to  bask  in  the  inimitable 
play  and  sparkle  of  his  wit  and  fancy,  or  to  be  thrilled  by  his 
indignant  and  caustic  allusions  to  passing  events  at  home  and 
abroad,  whenever  it  was  noised  through  the  house  that  Fred 
erick  Douglass  was  calling  on  his  friends.  Chief  of  all  these 
triumphs  over  '  race,  color  and  previous  condition  of  servitude  ' 
was  that  in  the  superb  Corinthian  Hall,  then  the  handsomest 
audience  chamber  in  all  that  part  of  the  State.  Its  brilliantly- 
lighted  interior  was  an  enchantment  to  everybody,  with  the 
delicate  and  dainty  white  lilies  pouring  out  of  their  lovely 


"THE  MAN  WHO  is  RIGHT  is  A  MAJORITY.        229 

chalices  the  blazing  gas-jets,  upon  rich  and  poor,  white  and 
black,  high  and  low,  assembled  to  hear  the  unsurpassed  elo 
quence  of  Frederick  Douglass,  on  the  crime  and  shame  of  our 
country,  which  permitted,  sanctioned,  and  defended,  with  all  its 
machinery  of  government  and  religion,  the  horrible  merchan 
dise  in  men,  women  and  children — himself  but  lately  redeemed 
from  the  clutches  of  the  foul  demon  of  slavery  by  the  philan 
thropy  of  English  friends,  who  admiringly  placed  his  bust  in 
white  marble  on  its  grand  Merchant's  Exchange  in  London. 
Where  could  Campbell's  stinging  satire  sound  so  impressively 
as  from  those  lips  in  Corinthian  Hall  in  1850  ? 

"  '  United  States,  your  banner  wears 

Two  emblems — one  of  fame  ; 
Alas  !  the  other  that  it  bears 
Reminds  us  of  your  shame. 

"  '  The  white  man's  liberty  in  types 

Is  blazoned  by  your  stars  ; 
But  what's  the  meaning  of  your  stripes  ? 
They  mean  your  negro's  scars.' 

"  One  incident  of  that  Rochester  life  is  indelibly  engraved  on 
my  mind.  My  dear  friend,  Maria  Porter,  took  me  with  her  to 
ever  holy  Mount  Hope.  Her  valued  sister  Jane's  was  the  new 
grave  we  were  visiting.  As  we  stood  there  by  it,  I  saw  a  small, 
newly-made  mound,  and  knowing  of  no  child's  death  in  their 
circle,  I  asked  in  surprise  whose  grave  is  that  ?  '  Why  that  is 
little  Anna  Douglass's.  Mr.  Douglass  had  selected  no  lot — 
and  poor,  dear,  little  Anna  grieved  herself  to  death  with  fright 
and  terror  over  her  father's  flight  to  England,  to  escape  the  fate 
of  old  John  Brown.  Mrs.  Douglass  wished  to  have  the  precious 
body  placed  in  the  receiving  tomb  of  the  city  till  Mr.  Douglass's 
return,  and  choice  and  purchase  of  a  lot  for  its  final  repose. 
Do  you  know  the  city  authorities  utterly  refused  to  let  that 
innocent  child  lie  in  its  common  tomb  ?  So  S.  D.  Porter  and 
we  all  said,  "  Lay  her  in  our  lot ;  "  and  there  she  lies  beside  our 
blessed  Jane.'  " 


CHAPTER  IX. 

"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING." 

FORTUNATE  is  the  biographer  whose  hero  supplies 
such  headings  for  chapters.  No  words  could  better 
indicate  the  quarter  from  which  suddenly  came  rein 
forcements  that  completely  changed  the  position  of 
the  Abolitionists.  Previous  to  1854  they  were  like 
the  rebel  Jews  who  resisted  Titus,  shut  up  in  their 
holy  city,  surrounded  by  an  overwhelming  army  of 
the  heathen,  fighting  fiercely  against  the  besiegers 
and  even  more  fiercely  among  themselves.  The 
parallel  would  be  a  closer  one,  if  Jerusalem  had  held 
out  long  enough  to  find  a  friendly  emperor  mount 
the  throne.  Hitherto  we  have  looked  only  at  the 
little  anti-slavery  bands  and  the  great  pro-slavery 
host.  We  have  not  yet  had  much  occasion  to  notice 
the  existence  of  the  neutral  North.  The  number  of 
Northerners  who  were  in  favor  of  slavery  was  small 
compared  to  that  of  the  men  who  regretted  its 
existence,  but  saw  no  way  of  getting  rid  of  it  ;  who 
found  little  fault  with  the  Garrisonian  principle,  but 
much  with  the  method  ;  who  kept  aloof  from  the  Free 
Soil  party,  because  they  were  afraid  of  throwing 
away  their  votes;  and  who  tried  to  elect  one  pro- 
slavery  candidate  after  another,  partly  because  he 
seemed  less  pro-slavery  than  his  opponent,  and  partly 
230 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN   HE  IS  FEEDING."      231 

because  they  liked  subordinate  features  of  the  plat 
form.  This  neutral  position  was  the  most  advanced 
one  which  had  yet  been  taken,  except  by  isolated  indi 
viduals,  in  the  Northwest  ;  arid  this  was  the  attitude 
of  the  vast  majority  of  the  clergy,  even  in  New 
England  where  most  of  the  ministers  really  sympa 
thized  with  the  slave,  but  not  so  warmly  as  to  over 
come  the  combined  influence  of  dislike  at  those  inno 
vations  which  were  allied  with  Garrisonianism,  of 
indignation  at  the  censures  which  the'  Church 
received  from  Abolitionists,  and  of  deference  to  the 
conservatism,  not  only  of  wealthy  laymen,  but  of 
leading  divines.  It  was  not  because  the  Southerners 
had  so  much  cordial  support,  but  because  they  had 
so  little  active  opposition  at  the  North,  that  they  were 
able  to  pass  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  to  recover  hun 
dreds  of  bondmen  under  it,  and  to  elect  a  President 
who  wished  to  have  it  "  respected  cheerfully,"  with  a 
vote  so  large  as  seemed  to  have  swept  not  only  the 
hostile  Free  Soilers  out  of  existence  as  a  party,  but 
also  the  lukewarm  Whigs. 

This  victory  of  1852  emboldened  the  South  to 
insist  that  slavery  should  be  carried  beyond  the 
boundary  to  which  it  had  been  restricted  by  the 
Missouri  Compromise  of  1820,  and  should  take 
possession  of  a  new  region  ten  times  as  large  as 
Massachusetts,  with  a  much  less  severe  climate,  and 
with  a  soil  fertile  beyond  comparison.  Before  the 
close  of  1853  it  was  proposed  in  Congress  that  the 
compromise  should  be  set  aside,  that  settlers  should 
be  allowed  to  bring  their  slaves  into  the  Territories, 
about  to  be  organized  under  the  names  of  Kansas 
and  Nebraska,  and  that  the  final  decision,  whether 


232  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

these  should  form  free  or  slave  States,  should  be  left 
to  be  settled  by  the  inhabitants.  This  last  principle, 
known  as  that  of  "  Squatter  Sovereignty,"  had  Senator 
Douglas  for  a  prominent  advocate.  Opposition  was 
promptly  made,  not  only  by  Sumner,  Gerrit  Smith, 
and  other  anti-slavery  Congressmen,  but  also  by 
Edward  Everett,  who  had  hitherto  been  on  the  other 
side.  He  now  gave  a  strong  indication  of  what  a 
change  was  going  on  in  New  England,  by  presenting 
a  remonstrance  signed  by  more  than  three  thousand 
of  her  clergymen.  How  large  a  part  of  these 
petitioners  were  now  opposing  the  slave  power  for 
the  first  time  may  be  imagined  from  the  fact  that  the 
indignation  meeting,  which  was  held  in  Faneuil 
Hall,  on  the  afternoon  of  February  23,  1854,  had  a 
member  of  Congress,  who  had  voted  for  the  Fugitive 
Slave  Bill,  in  the  chair,  and  all  the  speakers,  as  well 
as  some  of  the  vice-presidents,  had  earned  a  place  on 
the  "  Liberator's  "  blackest  list.  Similar  meetings 
were  held  so  freely  all  over  the  North,  that  Senator 
Douglas  declared,  some  years  later,  that  he  could  have 
traveled  from  Boston  to  Chicago  by  the  light  of  his 
own  burning  effigies.  One  half  of  the  Northern  Demo 
crats  voted  with  all  the  Northern  Whigs  and  the 
Free  Soilers  against  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  Bill  in 
the  House  of  Representatives  ;  but  it  became  a  law, 
at  the  same  time  that  Anthony  Burns  was  sent  back 
to  slavery  from  Boston,  and  carried  through  the 
streets  by  soldiers  and  armed  policemen  in  open  day. 
All  the  appeals  of  Garrison,  Phillips,  Douglass, 
Beecher,  and  Mrs.  Stowe,  in  behalf  of  the  negro,  had 
awakened  but  little  interest  compared  with  that 
called  out  by  the  attempts  of  the  South  to  prevent 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING."     233 

Northern  white  men  from  settling  Kansas,  and  to 
drive  them  out  by  inroads  of  border-ruffians  from 
Missouri,  backed  by  federal  troops.  Public  senti 
ment  sanctioned  not  only  the  supply  of  rifles  to 
emigrants,  who  flocked  in  from  Massachusetts,  Ohio, 
and  other  Northern  States,  but  the  formation  of 
guerrilla  bands  under  John  Brown  and  other 
captains.  The  Fugitive  Slave  Bill  was  decided  to  be 
unconstitutional  in  Wisconsin  ;  and  laws  to  hinder 
its  execution  were  passed  by  Michigan,  as  well  as  by 
the  New  England  States.  The  Whigs  united  with 
the  Free  Soilers,  and  the  new  party  took  the  name 
Republican  in  July,  1854.  The  outrages  upon  Free 
State  settlers  in  that  year  and  the  next  caused  the 
anti-slavery  vote  of  New  England  to  rise  from  57,143, 
in  1852,  to  184,850  in  1855,  and  307,417  in  1856.  The 
figures  for  New  York  are  25,359,  136,698,  and  276,004. 
The  change  throughout  the  Union  was  from  156,149 
votes  in  1852  to  1,341,264  in  1856.  Eleven  States 
were  then  carried  for  Fremont,  whereas  not  a  single 
electoral  vote  had  ever  been  cast  for  any  of  the  Free 
Soil  or  Liberty  party  candidates.  The  neutral  North 
became  anti-slavery,  because  it  was  not  allowed  to 
feed  peaceably  in  Kansas. 

How  earnestly,  and  at  the  same  time  how  sensibly, 
Douglass  took  part  in  this  great  struggle,  may  be 
judged  from  the  speech  which  he  delivered  before  a 
great  audience  in  Chicago,  early  in  September,  1854. 
I  have  taken  care  to  copy  all  the  boldest  portions  ; 
and  there  is  also  a  cordial  eulogium  on  Senator  Doug 
las,  closing  with  the  remark  that  no  one  would  think 
any  the  less  of  that  name  if  it  should  be  placed  by 
the  nation  upon  the  scroll  of  Presidents.  He  begins 


234  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

by  claiming  to  be  an  American  citizen,  and  declaring 
that  : 


"  The  Constitution  knows  no  man  by  the  color  of  his  skin. 
The  men  who  made  it  were  too  noble  for  any  such  limitation 
of  humanity  and  human  rights.  The  word  '  white  '  is  a  mod 
ern  term  in  the  legislation  of  this  country.  It  was  never  used 
in  the  better  days  of  our  Republic,  but  has  sprung  up  within 
the  period  of  our  national  degeneracy."  ..."  I  am  here  simply 
as  an  American  citizen,  having  a  stake  in  the  weal  or  woe  of 
the  nation  in  common  with  other  citizens.  I  am  not  even  here 
as  the  agent  of  any  sect  or  party.  Parties  are  too  politic  and 
sects  are  too  sectarian,  to  select  one  of  my  odious  class,  and  of 
my  radical  opinions,  at  this  important  time  and  place  to  repre 
sent  them.  Nevertheless,  I  do  not  stand  alone  here.  There 
are  noble-minded  men  in  Illinois  who  are  neither  ashamed  of 
their  cause  nor  their  company.  Some  of  them  are  here  to 
night,  and  I  expect  to  meet  with  them  in  every  part  of  the 
State  where  I  may  travel.  But,  I  pray,  hold  no  man  or  party 
responsible  for  my  words,  for  I  am  no  man's  agent,  and  I  am 
no  party's  agent."  ..."  It  is  alleged  that  I  am  come  to  this 
State  to  insult  Senator  Douglas.  Among  gentlemen  that  is 
only  an  insult  which  is  intended  to  be  such,  and  I  disavow  all 
such  intention.  I  am  not  even  here  with  the  desire  to  meet  in 
public  debate  that  gentleman.  I  am  here  precisely  as  I  was  in 
this  State  one  year  ago — with  no  other  change  in  my  relations 
to  you,  or  to  the  great  question  of  human  freedom,  than  time 
and  circumstances  have  brought  about.  I  shall  deal  with  the 
subject  with  the  same  spirit  now  as  then,  approving  such  men 
and  such  measures  as  look  to  the  security  of  liberty  in  the  land, 
and  with  my  whole  heart  condemning  all  such  men  and 
measures,  as  serve  to  subvert  or  endanger  it.  If  Hon.  S.  A. 
Douglas,  your  beloved  and  highly  gifted  Senator,  has  design 
edly,  or  through  mistaken  notions  of  public  policy,  ranged  him 
self  on  the  side  of  oppressors  and  the  deadliest  enemies  of 
liberty,  I  know  of  no  reason,  either  in  this  world  or  in  any  other 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING."     235 

world,  which  should  prevent  me,  or  prevent  any  one  else,  from 
thinking  so,  or  from  saying  so. 

"  The  people  in  whose  cause  I  come  here  to-night  are  not 
among  those  whose  right  to  regulate  their  own  domestic  con 
cerns  is  so  feelingly,  and  earnestly,  and  eloquently  contended 
for  in  certain  quarters.  They  have  no  Stephen  Arnold  Doug 
las — no  General  Cass,  to  contend  at  North  Market  Hall  for  their 
popular  sovereignty.  They  have  no  national  purse,  no  offices,  no 
reputation,  with  which  to  corrupt  Congress,  or  to  tempt  men, 
mighty  in  eloquence  and  influence,  into  their  service.  Oh,  no  ! 
They  have  nothing  to  commend  them  but  their  unadorned 
humanity.  They  are  human — that's  all — only  human.  Nature 
owns  them  as  human — God  owns  them  as  human  ;  but  men  own 
them  as  property,  and  only  as  property.  Every  right  of  human 
nature,  as  such,  is  denied  them ;  they  are  dumb  in  their 
chains.  To  utter  one  groan  or  scream  for  freedom  in  the 
presence  of  the  Southern  advocate  of  popular  sovereignty,  is 
to  bring  down  the  frightful  lash  upon  their  quivering  flesh. 
I  know  this  suffering  people  ;  I  am  acquainted  with  their  sor 
rows  ;  I  am  one  with  them  in  experience ;  I  have  felt  the  lash 
of  the  slave-driver,  and  stand  up  here  with  all  the  bitter  recol 
lection  of  its  horrors  vividly  upon  me. 

"  There  are  special  reasons  why  I  should  speak,  and  speak 
freely.  The  right  of  speech  is  a  very  precious  one.  I  under 
stand  that  Mr.  Douglas  regards  himself  as  the  most  abused 
man  in  the  United  States  ;  and  that  the  greatest  outrage  ever 
committed  upon  him  was  in  the  case  in  which  your  indignation 
raised  your  voices  so  high  that  his  could  not  be  heard.  No 
personal  violence,  as  I  understand,  was  offered  him.  It  seems 
to  have  been  a  trial  of  vocal  powers  between  the  individual  and 
the  multitude ;  and,  as  might  have  been  expected,  the  voice  of 
one  man  was  not  equal  in  volume  to  the  voices  of  five  thousand. 
I  do  not  mention  this  circumstance  to  approve  it ;  I  do  not 
approve  it.  I  am  for  free  speech,  as  well  as  for  free  men  and 
free  soil  ;  but  how  ineffably  insignificant  is  this  wrong  done  in 
a  single  instance,  compared  to  the  stupendous  iniquity  perpet 
uated  against  more  than  three  millions  of  the  American  people, 


2$6  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

who  are  struck  dumb  by  the  very  men  in  whose  cause  Mr.  Sen 
ator  Douglas  was  here  to  plead  !  While  I  would  not  approve 
the  silencing  of  Mr.  Douglas,  may  we  not  hope  that  this  slight 
abridgment  of  his  rights  may  lead  him  to  respect  in  some 
degree  the  rights  of  other  men,  as  good  in  the  eye  of  Heaven  as 
himself  ? 

"  Let  us  now  consider  the  great  question  of  the  age,  the  only 
great  national  question  which  seriously  agitates  the  public  mind 
at  this  hour.  It  is  called  the  vexed  question,  and  excites  alarm 
in  every  quarter  of  the  country.  .  .  . 

"  The  proposition  to  repeal  the  Missouri  Compromise,  was  a 
stunning  one.  It  fell  upon  the  nation  like  a  bolt  from  a  cloud 
less  sky.  The  thing  was  too  startling  for  belief.  You  believed 
in  the  South  ;  and  you  believed  in  the  North  ;  and  you  knew 
that  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  was  a  breach  of 
honor;  and,  therefore,  you  said  that  the  thing  could  not  be 
done.  Besides,  both  parties  had  pledged  themselves  directly, 
positively,  and  solemnly  against  re-opening  in  Congress  the 
agitation  on  the  subject  of  slavery  ;  and  the  President  himself 
had  declared  his  intention  to  maintain  the  national  quiet. 
Upon  these  assurances  you  rested,  and  rested  fatally.  But  you 
should  have  learned  long  ago  that  men  do  not  '  gather  grapes 
of  thorns,  or  figs  of  thistles.'  It  is  folly  to  put  faith  in  men 
who  have  broken  faith  with  God.  When  a  man  has  brought 
himself  to  enslave  a  child  of  God,  to  put  fetters  on  his  brother, 
he  has  qualified  himself  to  disregard  the  most  sacred  of  com 
pacts  :  beneath  the  sky  there  is  nothing  more  sacred  than  man, 
and  nothing  can  be  properly  respected  when  manhood  is 
despised  and  trampled  upon.  .  .  . 

"  It  is  said  that  slavery  is  the  creature  of  positive  law,  and 
that  it  can  only  exist  where  it  is  sustained  by  positive  law — that 
neither  in  Kansas  nor  Nebraska  is  there  any  law  establishing 
slavery  and  that,  therefore,  the  moment  a  slave-holder  carries 
his  slave  into  those  territories,  he  is  free  and  restored  to  the 
rights  of  human  nature.  This  is  the  ground  taken  by  General 
Cass.  He  contended  for  it  in  the  North  Market  Hall,  with 
much  eloquence  and  skill.  I  thought,  while  I  was  hearing  him 


"BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  is  FEEDING."    237 

on  this  point,  that  slave-holders  would  not  be  likely  to  thank 
him  for  the  argument.  Theoretically  the  argument  is  good  ; 
practically  the  argument  is  bad.  It  is  not  true  that  slavery 
cannot  exist  without  being  established  by  positive  law.  The 
instance  cannot  be  shown  where  a  law  was  ever  made  estab 
lishing  slavery,  where  the  relation  of  master  and  slave  did  not 
previously  exist.  The  law  is  always  an  after-coming  consider 
ation.  Wicked  men  first  overpower,  and  subdue  their  fellow- 
men  to  slavery,  and  then  call  in  the  law  to  sanction  the  deed. 
Even  in  the  slave  States  of  America,  slavery  has  never  been 
established  by  positive  law.  It  was  not  established  under  the 
colonial  charters  of  the  original  States,  nor  the  constitutions  of 
the  States.  It  is  now,  and  has  always  been,  a  system  of  lawless 
violence.  On  this  proposition  I  hold  myself  ready  and  willing 
to  meet  any  defender  of  the  Nebraska  Bill.  I  would  not  even 
hesitate  to  meet  the  author  of  that  bill  himself.  .  .  . 

"  He  says  he  wants  no  broad,  black  line  across  this  Continent. 
Such  a  line  is  odious,  and  begets  unkind  feelings  between 
the  citizens  of  a  common  country.  Now,  fellow-citizens,  why  is 
the  line  of  thirty-six  degrees,  thirty  minutes,  a  broad  black 
line  ?  What  is  it  that  entitles  it  to  be  called  a  black  line  ?  It  is 
the  fashion  to  call  whatever  is  odious  in  this  country,  black. 
You  call  the  devil  black,  and  he  may  be ;  but  what  is  there  in 
the  line  of  thirty-six  degrees,  thirty  minutes,  which  makes  it 
blacker  than  the  line  which  separates  Illinois  from  Missouri,  or 
Michigan  from  Indiana  ?  I  can  see  nothing  in  the  line  itself 
which  should  make  it  black  or  odious.  It  is  a  line,  that's  all. 
If  it  is  black,  black  and  odious,  it  must  be  so,  not  because  it  is 
a  line,  but  because  of  the  things  it  separates.  If  it  keeps  asunder 
what  God  has  joined  together — or  separates  what  God  intended 
should  be  fused,  then  it  may  be  called  an  odious  line,  a  black 
line  ;  but  if,  on  the  other  hand,  it  marks  only  a  distinction 
natural  and  eternal,  a  distinction  fixed  in  the  nature  of  things 
by  the  eternal  God,  then  I  say,  withered  be  the  arm  and  blasted 
be  the  hand  that  would  blot  it  out.  .  .  . 

"  Nothing  could  be  further  from  the  truth,  than  to  say  that 
popular  sovereignty  is  accorded  to  the  people  who  may  settle 


238  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

the  territories  of  Kansas  and  Nebraska.  The  three  great 
cardinal  powers  of  government  are  the  executive,  legislative,  and 
judicial.  Are  these  powers  secured  to  the  people  of  Kansas  and 
Nebraska  ?  You  know  they  are  not.  That  bill  places  the  people 
of  that  territory  as  completely  under  the  powers  of  the  federal 
government  as  Canada  is  under  the  British  crown.  By  this 
Kansas-Nebraska  Bill  the  federal  government  has  the  substance 
of  all  governing  power,  while  the  people  have  the  shadow.  The 
judicial  power  of  the  territories  is  not  from  the  people  of  the 
territories,  who  are  so  bathed  in  the  sunlight  of  popular  sover 
eignty  by  stump  eloquence,  but  from  the  federal  government. 
The  executive  power  of  the  territories  derives  its  existence  not 
from  the  overflowing  fountain  of  popular  sovereignty,  but  from 
the  federal  government.  The  secretaries  of  the  territories  are 
not  appointed  by  the  sovereign  people  of  the  territories,  but  are 
appointed  independently  of  popular  sovereignty. 

"  But  is  there  nothing  in  this  bill  which  justifies  the  supposi 
tion  that  it  contains  the  principle  of  popular  sovereignty  ?  No, 
not  one  word.  Even  the  territorial  counsels,  elected,  not  by 
the  people  who  may  settle  in  the  territories,  but  by  only  certain 
descriptions  of  people,  are  subject  to  a  double  veto  power, 
vested  first  in  a  governor,  whom  they  did  not  elect,  and  second 
in  the  President  of  the  United  States.  The  only  shadow  of 
popular  sovereignty  is  the  power  given  to  the  people  of  the 
territories  by  this  bill  to  have,  hold,  buy,  and  sell  human  beings. 
The  sovereign  right  to  make  slaves  of  his  fellow-men  if  they 
choose,  is  the  only  sovereignty  that  the  bill  secures.  In  all 
else,  popular  sovereignty  means  only  what  the  boy  meant,  when 
he  said  he  was  going  to  live  with  his  uncle  Robert.  He  said 
he  was  going  there,  and  that  he  meant  while  there  to  do  just 
what  he  pleased,  if  his  uncle  Robert  would  let  him.  .  .  . 

"  But  it  may  be  said  that  Congress  has  the  right  to  allow  the 
people  of  the  territories  to  hold  slaves.  The  answer  is,  that 
Congress  is  made  up  of  men,  and  possesses  only  the  right  of  men; 
and  unless  it  can  be  shown  that  some  men  have  a  right  to  hold 
their  fellow-men  as  property,  Congress  has  no  such  right. 
There  is  not  a  man  within  the  sound  of  my  voice,  who  has  not 


"BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  is  FEEDING.      239 

as  good  a  right  to  enslave  a  brother  man,  as  Congress  has. 
This  will  not  be  denied  even  by  slave-holders.  Then  I  put  the 
question  to  you,  each  of  you,  all  of  you,  have  you  any  such 
right  ?  To  admit  such  a  right  is  to  charge  God  with  folly,  to 
substitute  anarchy  for  order,  and  to  turn  earth  into  a  hell.  And 
you  know  better.  Now,  friends  and  fellow-citizens,  I  am  utter 
ing  no  new  sentiments  at  this  point,  and  am  making  no  new 
argument.  In  this  respect  there  is  nothing  new  under  the  sun. 
"  Error  may  be  new,  or  it  may  be  old,  since  it  is  founded  in  a 
misapprehension  of  what  truth  is.  It  has  its  beginnings  ;  and 
it  has  its  endings.  But  not  so  with  truth.  Truth  is  eternal. 
Like  the  great  God,  from  whose  throne  it  emanates,  it  is  from 
everlasting  unto  everlasting,  and  can  never  pass  away.  Such  a 
truth  is  a  man's  right  to  freedom.  He  was  born  with  it.  It 
was  his  before  he  comprehended  it.  The  title-deed  to  it  is 
written  by  the  Almighty  on  his  heart ;  and  the  record  of  it  is  in 
the  bosom  of  the  Eternal ;  and  never  can  Stephen  A.  Douglas 
efface  it,  unless  he  can  tear  from  the  great  heart  of  God  this 
truth  ;  and  this  mighty  government  of  ours  will  never  be  at 
peace  with  God,  unless  it  shall,  practically  and  universally, 
embrace  this  great  truth  as  the  foundation  of  all  its  institutions, 
and  the  rule  of  its  entire  administration.  Now,  gentlemen — I 
have  done.  I  have  no  fear  for  the  ultimate  triumph  of  free 
principles  in  this  country.  The  signs  of  the  times  are  propi 
tious.  Victories  have  been  won  by  slavery  ;  but  they  have  never 
been  won  against  the  onward  march  of  anti-slavery  principles. 
The  progress  of  these  principles  has  been  constant,  steady, 
strong,  and  certain.  Every  victory  won  by  slavery  has  had  the 
effect  to  fling  our  principles  more  widely  and  favorably  among 
the  people.  The  annexation  of  Texas — the  Florida  war — the 
war  with  Mexico— the  compromise  measures,  and  the  repeal  of 
the  Missouri  Compromise  have  all  signally  vindicated  the  wis 
dom  of  the  great  God,  who  has  promised  to  over-rule  the 
wickedness  of  men  for  his  own  glory — to  confound  the  wisdom 
of  the  crafty,  and  bring  to  naught  the  counsels  of  the  ungodly." 

Mr.  Douglass  tells  me  that  during  the  tour  through 


240  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Illinois  which  began  thus,  his  namesake,  whom  he 
calls  "  an  undersized  Daniel  Webster,"  refused  to 
speak  at  Rockford,  because  he  did  not  wish  to  en 
counter  that  "  negro  impostor  who  had  been  called  in 
to  hunt  him  down."  They  did  finally  meet  at  Free- 
port,  where  the  Senator  was  "  very  courteous  both  in 
public  and  in  private." 

Our  orator  had  hitherto  trusted  entirely  to  his  gift 
for  extempore  speech,  and  had  become  so  famous  for 
his  power  of  thinking  on  his  legs,  that  Wendell  Phil 
lips  spoke  of  him  to  a  friend  of  mine,  as  "  possessed 
of  more  genius  than  any  other  man  in  the  anti-slavery 
ranks."  When  he  assumed  the  responsibilities  of 
editing  the  "  North  Star,"  he  gave  up  parodies,  used 
mimicry  more  sparingly,  and  began  to  write  out 
portions  of  his  addresses.  After  one  of  these  experi 
ments,  in  Western  New  York,  he  went  home  to  spend 
the  night  with  a  Quaker,  named  Pliny  Sexton.  Anx 
iety  to  find  out  how  well  he  had  succeeded  made  him 
keep  silent,  and  wait  for  his  host  to  say  something. 
There  was  nothing  more  than  a  Quaker  meeting, 
however,  until  they  were  about  to  bid  each  other 
"  Good-night."  Then  Pliny,  who,  by  the  way,  was 
a  Garrisonian,  said,  "  Frederick,  the  poorest  part  of 
thy  lecture  was  the  written  part." 

On  July  12,  1854,  he  took  part,  for  the  first  time  in 
his  life,  in  the  exercises  of  a  college  commencement. 
An  invitation  to  deliver  an  address  had  come  from  a 
literary  society  in  the  Western  Reserve  College,  then 
at  Hudson,  Ohio,  but  now  at  Cleveland.  The  Presi 
dent  and  the  rest  of  the  Faculty  were  much  distressed 
at  the  invitation,  as  he  found  out  afterwards  ;  and  he 
did  right  in  taking  for  his  subject,  the  Claims  of  the 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING."     241 

Negro.  Unfortunately,  however,  he  treated  of  the 
question  ethnologically,  and  tried  to  prove,  not  only 
that  the  negro  sprang  from  the  same  original  ancestry 
as  other  men,  but  that  he  had  a  peculiarly  close  rela 
tionship  with  the  ancient  Egyptians.  Neither  of 
these  opinions  is  now  held  by  Douglass  ;  but  he  did 
not  change  his  mind  about  the  builders  of  the  pyra 
mids,  until  he  had  made  a  journey  to  Egypt  in  order 
to  satisfy  himself  on  this  point.  He  also  made  the 
mistake  of  merely  reading  his  address  ;  and  it  had 
much  less  effect  than  his  extempore  remarks  at  the 
collation  afterwards.  There  is  at  least  one  fine  pas 
sage,  which  ought  still  to  be  kept  fresh  in  our  re 
membrance,  where  he  says,  in  regard  to  the  supposi 
tion  that  the  colored  people  may  ultimately  die  out 
from  among  us  : 

"  The  statistics  of  the  country  afford  no  encouragement  for 
such  a  conjecture.  The  history  of  the  negro  race  proves  them 
to  be  wonderfully  adapted  to  all  countries,  all  climates,  all 
conditions."  ...  "  The  poor  bondman  lifts  a  smiling  face 
above  the  surface  of  a  sea  of  agonies,  hoping  on,  hoping  ever. 
His  tawny  brother,  the  Indian,  dies  under  the  flashing  glance  of 
the  Anglo-Saxon.  Not  so  the  negro ;  civilization  cannot  kill 
him.  He  accepts  it,  becomes  a  part  of  it."  ...  •"'  All  the  facts 
in  his  history  mark  out  for  him  a  destiny  united  to  America 
and  Americans.  Now,  whether  this  population  shall,  by  free 
dom,  industry,  virtue,  and  intelligence  be  made  a  blessing  to 
the  country  and  the  world,  or  whether  their  multiplied  wrongs 
shall  kindle  the  vengeance  of  an  offended  God,  will  depend  upon 
the  conduct  of  no  class  of  men  so  much  as  upon  the  scholars  of 
the  country."- 

His  most  important  publication  previous  to  1882 
was  the  enlarged  edition  of  the  "  Narrative,"  which 
appeared  in  1855,  under  the  title  "  My  Bondage  and 


242  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

My  Freedom,"  with  an  Introduction  by  Dr.  James 
M'Cune  Smith.  There  is  a  portrait,  taken  from  a 
daguerreotype,  and  showing  much  sterner  features 
than  those  which  usher  in  the  volumes  of  1845  and 
1882.  The  signature  below  indicates  that  his  hand 
writing  had  become  less  delicate  and  feminine  than 
it  was  ten  years  before,  and  had  acquired  its  present 
manly  vigor.  The  dedication  is  to  Gerrit  Smith. 
The  preface  by  Garrison,  which  had  appeared  in 
1845,  is  omitted,  with  the  letter  from  Phillips  and 
the  appendix  about  religion.  The  publishers  were 
Miller,  Orton,  and  Mulligan,  in  New  York  and  Auburn ; 
the  volume  contains  nearly  five  hundred  pages,  in 
cluding  the  Introduction  and  appendix  ;  and  the 
latter  gives  extracts  from  seven  speeches,  and  also 
a  letter  to  Thomas  Auld.  The  account  in  the 
"  Narrative,"  of  the  author's  life  up  to  1841,  was  re 
written,  with  frequent  additions  of  graphic  details, 
so  as  to  be  enlarged  to  a  size  almost  three  times  as 
great  as  before,  and  to  occupy  about  fifty  per  cent, 
more  space  in  this  version  of  1855  than  in  that  of 
1882,  which  did  not,  I  think,  gain  by  abridgment. 
The  period  from  1841  to  1855  is  given  at  much  greater 
length  in  the  version  of  1882,  however,  than  any  part 
of  it  had  ever  been  before ;  and  described  on  the 
whole  with  greater  vigor,  although  many  character 
istic  passages  have  been  omitted.  This  much  has 
been  said  about  "  My  Bondage  and  My  Freedom," 
because  it  seems  to  have  become  rather  a  rare  book, 
and  its  disappearance  would  be  a  great  loss. 

The  most  curious  thing  about  this  book  is  an 
opinion  which  was  passed  upon  it  by  Garrison,  and 
which  is  here  quoted  as  an  act  of  justice  to  those 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING.  '     243 

philanthropic  people  who  differed  from  him.  George 
Thompson  gave  "  My  Bondage  and  My  Freedom  "  a 
friendly  notice  in  his  own  organ,  but  this  led  Garri 
son  to  write  him  a  letter,  part  of  which  soon  found 
its  way  into  the  "  Liberator,"  for  January  18,  1856. 
It  is  a  protest  against  this  u  panegyric  upon  Frederick 
Douglass's  new  volume,  *  My  Bondage  and  My  Free 
dom,'  a  volume  remarkable,  it  is  true,  for  its  thrilling 
sketches  of  a  slave's  life  and  experience,  and  for  the 
ability  displayed  in  its  pages,  but  which,  in  its  second 
portion,  is  reeking  with  the  virus  of  personal  malig 
nity  towards  Wendell  Phillips,  myself,  and  the  old 
organizationists  generally,  and  full  of  ingratitude  and 
baseness  towards  as  true  and  disinterested  friends  as 
any  man  ever  yet  had  upon  earth."  The  only  pages 
which  could  possibly  be  referred  to,  acknowledge 
that  he  went  to  Rochester  "  from  motives  of  peace," 
say  nothing  about  Phillips,  speak  of  Garrison  as  "  the 
known  and  distinguished  advocate  "  of  the  non-voting 
principle,  mention  that  "  To  abstain  from  voting  was 
to  refuse  to  exercise  a  legitimate  and  powerful  means 
for  abolishing  slavery,"  and  say,  finally,  "  To  those 
with  whom  I  had  been  in  agreement  and  sympathy, 
I  was  now  in  opposition.  What  they  held  to  be  a 
great  and  important  truth,  I  now  looked  upon  as  a 
dangerous  error.  A  very  painful,  and  yet  a  very 
natural  thing  now  happened.  Those  who  could  not 
see  any  honest  reasons  for  changing  their  views,  as  I 
had  done,  could  not  easily  see  any  such  reasons  for  my 
change  ;  and  the  common  punishment  of  apostates 
was  mine.  The  opinions  first  entertained  were 
naturally  derived,  and  honestly  entertained  ;  and  I 
trust  that  my  present  opinions  have  the  same  title  to 


244  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

respect."  If  there  is  any  "virus"  in  these  words  it 
is  only  such  as  has  always  been  greatly  needed  for 
the  inoculation  of  reformers. 

I  am  not  aware  that  Douglass  ever  spoke  more 
severely  of  Garrison  than  in  1879,  when  he  said  this  : 

"  Massachusetts  is  a  great  State  ;  she  has  done  many  great 
things ;  she  has  given  to  our  country  many  scholars  and  states 
men,  many  poets  and  philosophers,  many  discoverers  and 
inventors ;  but  no  son  of  hers  has  won  for  her  a  more  enduring 
honor,  or  for  himself  a  more  enduring  fame,  than  William  Lloyd 
Garrison.  No  one  of  her  sons  has  stamped  his  convictions  in 
lines  so  clear,  deep,  and  ineffaceable  into  the  very  life  and  future 
of  the  Republic.  Of  no  man  is  it  more  true  than  of  him — that 
being  dead  he  yet  speaketh.  The  lessons  he  taught  fifty  years 
ago  from  his  garret  in  Boston  are  only  yet  half  learned  by  the 
nation.  His  work  will  not  stop  at  his  grave.  Our  general  has 
fallen  ;  but  his  army  will  march  on.  His  words  of  wisdom, 
justice,  and  truth  will  be  echoed  by  the  voices  of  the  millions, 
till  every  jot  and  tittle  of  all  his  prophecies  shall  be  fulfilled. 
Mr.  President,  this  is  not  the  time  and  place  for  a  critical  and 
accurate  measurement  of  William  Lloyd  Garrison  ;  but  when 
it  comes,  no  friend  of  his  has  need  to  fear  the  application  to  him 
of  the  severest  test  of  honest  and  truthful  criticism.  He  never 
refused  to  see,  nor  allow  his  readers  to  see,  in  the  '  Liberator,' 
the  worst  that  was  thought,  felt,  and  said  of  him.  A  candid 
examination  of  his  character  and  his  work  in  the  world  may 
disclose  some  things  we  would  have  had  otherwise.  Speaking 
for  myself,  I  must  frankly  say  I  have  sometimes  thought  him 
uncharitable  to  those  who  differed  from  him.  Honest  himself, 
he  could  not  always  see  how  men  could  differ  from  him  and 
still  be  honest.  To  say  this  of  him  is  simply  to  say  that  he  was 
human  ;  and  it  may  be  added  that  when  he  erred  here,  he  erred 
in  the  interest  of  truth.  He  revolted  at  halmess,  abhorred  com 
promise,  and  demanded  that  men  should  be  either  hot  or  cold. 
This  great  quality  of  the  man,  though  sometimes  in  excess,  is 


"BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING."      245 

one  explanation  of  his  wonderful  and  successful  leadership. 
What  it  cost  him  in  breadth  and  numbers,  it  gained  him  in 
condensation  and  intensity.  He  held  his  little  band  well  in 
hand  all  the  time,  and  close  to  his  person ;  no  leader  was  ever 
more  loved  by  the  circle  about  him.  Absolute  in  his  faith,  no 
sect  could  proselyte  him  ;  inflexible  in  his  principles,  no  party 
could  use  him ;  content  with  the  little  circle  about  him,  he  did 
not  mingle  directly  and  largely  with  the  great  masses  of  men. 
By  one  simple  principle  he  tried  all  men,  all  parties,  and  all 
sects.  They  that  were  not  for  him,  were  against  him.  What 
his  name  stood  for  in  the  beginning,  it  stands  for  now,  and  will 
so  stand  forever.  It  is  said  that  the  wicked  shall  not  live  out 
half  their  days.  This  is  true  in  more  senses  than  one  ;  for  '  The 
coward  and  the  small  in  soul  scarce  do  live.'  Mr.  Garrison 
lived  out  his  whole  existence.  For  to  live  is  to  battle  ;  and  he 
battled  from  first  to  last.  Although  he  had  reached  a  good 
old  age,  time  had  not  dimmed  his  intellect,  nor  darkened  his 
moral  vision,  nor  quenched  the  ardor  of  his  genius.  His  letter, 
published  three  weeks  before  his  death,  on  the  exodus  from 
Mississippi  and  Louisiana,  had  in  it  all  the  energy  and  fire  of 
his  youth.  Men  of  three  score  and  ten  are  apt  to  live  in  the 
past.  It  was  not  so  with  Mr.  Garrison.  He  was  during  his 
latest  years  fully  abreast  with  his  times.  No  event  or  circum 
stance  bearing  upon  the  cause  of  justice  and  humanity  escaped 
his  intelligent  observation.  His  letter  written  a  few  months 
ago  upon  the  Chinese  question  was  a  crowning  utterance.  It 
was  in  harmony  with  the  guiding  sentiment  of  his  life,  '  My 
country  is  the  world  ;  and  all  mankind  are  my  countrymen.' 
With  him  it  was  not  race  or  color,  but  humanity." 

One  result  of  the  publication  of  "  My  Bondage 
and  My  Freedom,"  was  that  a  bookseller  in  Mobile, 
who  had  been  a  slave-holder,  bought  not  only  a 
copy  which  had  been  ordered  but  two  others  to 
supply  possible  customers.  A  clergyman  in  the 
city  heard  of  this,  sent  his  son  to  buy  the  books, 


246  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

and  stirred  up  such  an  excitement  against  the 
bookseller  that  he  was  glad  to  steal  away  in  a  little 
sail-boat. 

While  still  busy  with  the  composition  of  this  work, 
its  author  was  invited  by  the  members  of  the  Legisla 
ture  to  address  them,  in  March,  1855,  in  the  Assembly 
Chamber  at  Albany.  There  he  denounced  not  only 
the  Nebraska  and  Fugitive  Slave  Bills,  but  also  the 
indifference  of  the  North  to  his  people's  wrongs.  An 
eye-witness  describes  the  rapt  attention  of  the 
crowded  audience  for  two  hours  and  a  half  as  the 
grandest  scene  he  ever  saw  in  the  capital  ;  and  the 
Lieutenant-Governor  said  he  would  give  twenty 
thousand  dollars  to  be  able  to  speak  as  powerfully. 
The  May  meeting  of  the  A.  A.  S.  S.  in  New  York 
gave  the  orator  an  opportunity  to  defend  a  proposi 
tion  which  he  had  already  submitted  to  them  in 
writing,  namely  that,  "  The  Garrisonian  views  of 
disunion,  if  carried  to  a  successful  issue,  would  only 
place  the  people  of  the  North  in  the  same  relation  to 
American  slavery  which  they  now  bear  to  the  slavery 
of  Cuba  or  Brazil."  He  defended  this  proposition  on 
May  10,  in  reply  to  the  assertion  of  another  fugitive 
from  slavery,  that  the  Union  was  of  no  value  to 
colored  people.  Then,  according  to  the  "  New  York 
Daily  News,"  "  A  grand  and  terrific  set-to  came  off 
between  Abby  Kelley  Foster,  Garrison,  and  Frederick 
Douglass,  who  defended  the  Union  while  claiming 
rights  for  his  people.  He  was  insulted,  interrupted, 
and  denounced  by  the  Garrison  Cabinet,  but  stood 
amid  them  and  overtopped  them  like  a  giant  among 
pigmies."  One  thing  said  against  him  was,  that  he 
had  no  more  right  to  call  himself  anti-slavery,  than  a 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING.         247 

moderate  drinker  has  to  try  to  pass  himself  off  for  a 
friend  of  temperance. 

Soon  after  this  debate,  he  told  the  colored  men, 
with  whom  he  was  holding  a  council  to  prepare  for  a 
national  convention  in  October,  that  he  knew  that  his 
plan  of  an  industrial  college  was  opposed  by  some  of 
the  Abolitionist  organs  : 

"  But  if  the  colored  people  would  ever  arrive  at  a  respectable 
place  in  society,  they  must  do  their  own  thinking.  The  colored 
people  are  now  the  '  sick  man  '  of  America ;  those  who  pretend 
to  be  their  friends  measure  their  places  and  pat  them  on  the 
back;  but  when  they  step  beyond  that  narrow  place,  their 
friends  become  villifiers  and  enemies." 

On  June  26,  27,  28,  there  was  a  convention  in  Syra 
cuse  of  men  who  had  agreed,  a  year  or  two  before,  to 
call  themselves  Radical  Political  Abolitionists.  The 
editorof  "  My  Bondage  and  My  Freedom,"  Dr.  Smith, 
presided  ;  and  among  other  speakers  were  Douglass, 
Gerrit  Smith,  Lewis  Tappan,  and  Rev.  S.  J.  May.  Ten 
States  were  represented,  besides  New  York  and 
Canada.  It  was  unanimously  resolved  that  the  mem 
bers  should  do  what  they  could  to  prevent  the  return 
of  fugitives  ;  but  there  was  some  difference  of 
opinion  in  consequence  of  a  proposal  to  raise  money 
to  enable  John  Brown,  who  was  going  out  that  fall  to 
join  his  sons  in  Kansas,  to  take  out  a  good  supply  of 
weapons.  Douglass,  who  had  known  him  well  for 
eight  years,  spoke  earnestly  in  his  behalf  ;  Tappan 
and  others  were  unwilling  to  encourage  violence  ;  but 
as  a  letter  recently  received  from  Hayti  says  :  "  The 
collection  was  taken  up  with  much  spirit,  neverthe 
less  ;  for  Captain  Brown  was  present  and  spoke  for 


248  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

himself ;  and  when  he  spoke,  men  believed  in  the 
man." 

The  national  colored  convention  came  off,  as  pro 
posed,  in  Philadelphia,  and  on  the  first  day,  October 
16,  there  was  an  evident  repugnance  to  the  admission 
of  the  only  delegate  from  Canada,  Miss  Shadd.  Her 
sex  was  so  much  against  her  that  Remond  thought 
it  best  to  make  a  compromise,  which  would  give 
her  a  seat  as  a  corresponding  member.  Douglass 
insisted  on  having  this  vote  reconsidered  ;  and  his 
speech  caused  her  to  be  recognized,  by  a  majority 
vote,  as  a  member  in  full  standing.  The  "  New  York 
Tribune "  had  endorsed  his  plan  for  an  industrial 
college  as  "  the  greatest  and  most  comprehensive  for 
elevating  the  colored  race  in  this  country  yet  pro 
posed."  Some  members  of  the  convention  saw  little 
need  of  such  an  institution,  at  a  time  when  more 
than  thirty  per  cent,  of  those  of  their  brethren  in  the 
North  who  were  trained  in  trades  and  professions 
were  prevented,  as  Douglass  himself  had  been,  by 
the  color  prejudice  from  carrying  them  on.  It  was 
also  urged  that  a  college  in  one  place  would  do  little 
good  at  a  distance  ;  and  much  was  said  in  favor  of  a 
mechanical  bureau,  which  should  employ  teachers  of 
special  trades  wherever  such  instruction  might  be 
demanded.  There  was  also  quite  a  controversy  as  to 
whether  slavery  could  be  abolished  constitutionally  ; 
but  here  Douglass  triumphed,  with  the  aid  of  his 
friend,  Dr.  Smith,  and  his  paper  was  formally 
acknowledged  to  be  "  our  organ." 

A  long  quotation  has  already  been  made  from  his 
pamphlet  on  "  the  Anti-Slavery  Movement  ;  "  it  also 
contains  an  expression  of  dissatisfaction  with  the 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN   HE   IS  FEEDING."      249 

newly    organized     Republican    party,    of    which    he 
says  : 

"  It  aims  to  limit  and  denationalize  slaver}-,  and  to  relieve  the 
Federal  Government  from  all  responsibility  for  slavery.  Its 
motto  is, '  Slavery,  Local ;  Liberty,  National.'  The  objection 
to  this  movement  is  the  same  as  that  against  the  American 
Anti-Slavery  Society.  It  leaves  the  slave  in  his  fetters,  in  the 
undisturbed  possession  of  his  master,  and  does  not  grapple  with 
the  question  of  emancipation  in  the  States." 

His  own  preference,  in  1855,  was  f°r  tne  Liberty 
party,  which  was  "  pledged  to  continue  the  struggle 
while  a  bondman  in  his  chains  remains  to  weep. 
Upon  its  platform  must  the  great  battle  of  freedom 
be  fought  out,  if  upon  any  short  of  the  bloody  field. 
It  must  be  under  no  partial  cry  of  '  No  union  with 
slave-holders,'  nor  selfish  cry  of  '  No  more  slavery 
extension,'  but  it  must  be,  '  No  slavery  for  man  under 
the  whole  heavens.'  " 

His  opinion  of  the  Republican  party  was  fully 
justified  in  1856,  when  its  convention,  at  Philadelphia, 
adopted  a  platform  which  had  nothing  to  say  against 
the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  or  in  favor  of  emancipation 
in  the  States ;  while  its  candidate,  Fremont,  was 
selected  with  no  more  reference  to  his  record  as  an 
Abolitionist  than  to  his  experience  as  a  statesman. 
So  far  at  least  as  the  conventions  of  1852  and  1856 
eould  be  compared,  there  was  perfect  truth  in  the 
statement  of  our  editor  in  1860:  "The  national 
conventions,  held  successively  in  Pittsburgh,  Philadel 
phia,  and  Chicago,  have  formed  a  regular  descent 
from  the  better  utterances  of  1848  at  Buffalo."  No 
colored  man  spoke  at  Philadelphia,  and  but  little 
was  said  by  Abolitionists.  The  candidates  of  the 


250  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

other  parties,  however,  for  President  were  Fillmore, 
who  had  signed  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  and  Buchanan, 
who  was  pledged  to  sustain  it  as  well  as  to  hinder 
Kansas  from  entering  the  Union  as  a  Free  State. 
Garrison  acknowledged  that  if  he  could  vote  for  any 
one,  it  would  be  for  Fremont  ;  and  Douglass  did  all 
he  could  to  elect  him. 

Among  the  pilgrims  to  Rochester,  in  1856,  was  Miss 
Ottilia  Assing,  who  afterwards  published  a  German 
translation  of  "  My  Bondage  and  My  Freedom." 
She  says  in  her  preface,  dated  1858,  that  twenty 
thousand  copies  of  the  original  had  already  been 
sold  ;  and  she  also  praises  the  author  for  "his  brill 
iancy,  cheerfulness,  and  refinement  in  conversation," 
as  well  as  for  "  his  success  in  calling  out  others  and 
elevating  them  to  his  own  height."  His  oratory  was 
"remarkable  for  complete  mastery  of  his  subject, 
keenness  in  argument,  and  perfect  moderation  amid 
all  his  passion.  Often  he  will  rise  to  a  tragic  grand 
eur,  and  then  he  will  illuminate  his  position,  as  with 
soldiers'  torches,  by  brilliant  flashes  of  wit.  He  will 
speak  to  the  heart  of  his  hearer,  and  then  divert  him 
with  gay  humor.  All  is  fresh,  original,  and  attract 
ive.  All  these  advantages  are  increased  by  a  perfect 
command  of  English,  and  a  voice  as  tender,  pleasing, 
and  flexible  as  any  I  ever  heard." 

The  poor  success  of  his  lecture  on  Ethnology  had 
stimulated  him  to  make  another  trial  of  his  strength, 
and  his  second  attempt  was  a  complete  success.  The 
lecture  on  "  Self-Made  Men,"  which  he  wrote  in  1855, 
was  in  great  demand  at  Lyceums,  especially  in  the 
West  ;  and  he  thus  found  himself  eminent  in  a  lucra 
tive  and  honorable  profession.  It  has  not  yet  been 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN   HE  IS  FEEDING.  '     251 

published,  and  the  manuscript  has  undergone  various 
changes  in  successive  years  of  use.  Among  the  most 
interesting  passages  are  these  : 

"  On  the  first  point,  I  may  say,  that  hy  self-made  men,  I 
mean  precisely  what  the  phrase  itself  imparts  to  the  popular 
mind.  They  are  the  men  who,  without  the  ordinary  helps  of 
favoring  circumstances,  have  attained  knowledge,  usefulness, 
power,  position,  and  fame  in  the  world.  They  are  the  men 
who  owe  nothing  to  birth,  relationship,  friendly  surroundings, 
wealth  inherited,  or  to  early  and  approved  means  of  educa 
tion  ;  who  are  what  they  are,  without  any  of  the  conditions  by 
which  other  men  usually  achieve  the  same  results.  In  fact, 
they  are  the  men  who  come  up,  not  only  without  the  voluntary 
assistance  or  friendly  co-operation  of  society,  but  often  in  open 
and  derisive  defiance  of  all  the  efforts  of  society  to  repress, 
retard,  and  keep  them  down.  In  a  world  of  schools,  academies, 
and  other  institutions  of  learning,  they  manage  in  some  way  to 
get  an  education  elsewhere,  and  in  other  conditions  hew  out  a 
way  for  themselves  and  become  the  architects  of  their  own 
fortunes.  In  a  peculiar  sense  they  are  indebted  to  themselves 
for  themselves.  If  they  have  traveled  far,  they  have  made  the 
road  on  which  they  traveled.  If  they  have  ascended  high,  they 
have  built  their  own  ladder.  It  is  hard  to  fathom  the  depths 
from  which  some  of  these  men  have  come.  From  the  heart 
less  pavements  of  the  large  and  crowded  cities — barefooted, 
homeless,  and  friendless — they  have  come.  From  hunger, 
rags,  and  destitution — motherless  and  fatherless — they  come. 
From  prisons,  slavery,  and  the  depths  of  infamy — they  come. 
Flung  overboard  in  the  midnight  storm,  on  the  broad  and 
tempest-tossed  ocean  of  life,  without  oars,  ropes,  or  life-pre 
servers,  they  are  the  men  who  have  bravely  buffeted  the  frown 
ing  billows  with  their  own  sinewy  arms,  and  have  risen  in 
safety,  where  other  men,  well  supplied  with  the  best  appli 
ances  of  safety  and  success  have  fainted,  despaired,  and  gone 
down.  Such  men  as  these,  whether  we  find  them  in  one  posi 
tion  or  another,  whether  in  the  college  or  the  factor)-,  whether 


252  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

professors  or  plowmen,  whether  of  Anglo-Saxon  or  Anglo- 
African  origin,  are  self-made  men,  and  are  entitled  to  a  cer 
tain  measure  of  respect  for  their  success.  Though  a  man  of 
this  class  may  not  claim  to  be  a  hero,  and  to  be  worshiped  as 
such,  there  is  genuine  heroism  in  his  struggle,  and  something 
of  sublimity  and  glory  in  his  triumph.  Every  instance  of  this 
kind  is  an  example  and  a  help  to  the  race.  It  assures  us  of  the 
latent  powers  and  resources  of  simple  and  unaided  manhood. 
It  robs  labor  of  pain  and  depression,  dispels  gloom  from  the 
brow  of  destitution,  and  enables  men  to  take  hold  of  the 
roughest  and  flintiest  hardships  incident  to  the  battle  of  life, 
with  lighter  hearts,  higher  hopes,  and  with  larger  courage.  .  .  . 
"  When  we  find  a  man  who  has  ascended  high  beyond  our 
selves,  who  has  a  broader  range  of  vision  than  we,  and  a  hori 
zon  with  more  stars  in  it  than  we  have,  we  may  know  that  he 
has  worked  harder,  better,  and  more  wisely  than  we  have.  He 
was  awake  while  we  slept,  was  busy  while  we  were  idle,  and 
wisely  improved  his  time  while  we  wasted  ours.  There  is 
nothing  good,  great,  or  desirable  in  this  world  which  man  can 
possess,  that  does  not  come  by  labor,  either  physical,  or  men 
tal.  A  man  may,  at  times,  get  something  for  nothing,  but  in 
his  hands  it  will  amount  to  nothing.  What  is  true  in  the 
world  of  matter  is  equally  true  in  the  world  of  mind.  There  is 
no  growth  without  exertion,  no  polish  without  friction,  no 
knowledge  without  labor,  no  progress  without  motion,  no  vic 
tory  without  conflict.  The  man  who  lies  down  a  fool  at  night, 
hoping  that  he  will  awake  wise  in  the  morning,  will  rise  up  in 
the  morning  as  he  laid  down  in  the  evening.  Faith  itself 
does  not  seem  worth  much,  if  anything,  in  the  absence  of 
work.  The  preacher  who  finds  it  easier  to  pray  for  know 
ledge  than  to  tax  his  brain  with  study,  will  find  his  congrega 
tion  growing  beautifully  less,  and  his  flock  looking  elsewhere 
for  the  mental  food.  Our  colored  ministers  are  somewhat 
remarkable  for  the  fervor  with  which  they  pray  for  knowledge ; 
but,  thus  far,  they  are  not  remarkable  for  any  wonderful  suc 
cess  ;  in  fact,  they  who  pray  loudest  seem  to  get  least.  They 
are  able  to  give  us  abundance  of  sound  for  destitution  of  sense. 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING."    253 

In  every  view  we  catch  of  the  perfection  of  the  universe, 
whether  we  look  to  the  stars  in  the  peaceful  blue  dome  above 
us,  or  to  the  long  line  where  land  and  water  maintain  eternal 
conflict — the  lesson  is  the  same.  It  is  labor,  movement,  earnest 
work.  These  beautifully  rounded  pebbles  which  you  hold  in 
your  hand,  and  marvel  at  their  exceeding  smoothness,  were 
chiselled  into  their  varied  and  graceful  forms  by  the  ceaseless 
action  of  countless  waves.  Nature  is  herself  a  great  worker, 
and  tolerates  no  contradictions  to  her  wise  example  without  cer 
tain  rebuke.  She  follows  inaction  by  stagnation,  stagnation  is 
followed  by  pestilence,  and  pestilence  by  death.  General  But 
ler,  busy  with  his  broom,  could  sweep  yellow-fever  out  of  New 
Orleans  ;  but  this  dread  destroyer  returned  when  Butler  and 
his  broom  were  withdrawn,  and  the  people  piously  ascribed  to 
Divinity,  what  was  simply  due  to  dirt.  From  these  remarks  it 
will  be  seen  that,  allowing  only  ordinary  natural  ability  and 
opportunity,  we  explain  success  by  one  word,  and  that  is 
'Work.'  .... 

"  America,  not  without  reason,  is  said  to  be  pre-eminently  the 
home  and  patron  of  self-made  men.  All  doors  fly  open  to  them. 
They  may  aspire  to  any  position.  Courts,  Senates,  Cabinets, 
spread  their  rich  carpets  for  their  feet,  and  they  stand  among 
our  foremost  men  in  every  honorable  service.  Many  causes 
have  made  it  possible  and  easy  for  this  class  to  rise  and  flour 
ish  here,  and  first  among  these  is  the  general  respectability  of 
labor.  Search  where  you  will,  there  is  no  country  on  the  globe 
where  labor  is  more  respected,  and  the  laborer  more  honored, 
than  in  this  country.  The  conditions  in  which  American  so 
ciety  originated,  the  free  spirit  that  framed  its  independence 
and  created  its  government,  based  upon  the  will  of  the  people, 
exalted  both  labor  and  the  laborer."  ..."  The  principle  of 
measuring  and  valuing  men,  according  to  their  respective 
merits,  is  better  established  and  more  generally  enforced  and 
observed  here  than  in  any  other  country.  In  Europe,  a  king 
can  make  a  belted  knight,  a  marquis,  duke,  and  a'  that ;  but 
here,  wealth  and  greatness  are  forced  by  no  such  capricious 


254  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

and  arbitrary  power.     Equality  of    rights  brings  equality  of 
dignity.  .  .  . 

"  By  these  remarks,  however,  no  disparagement  of  institutions 
of  learning  is  intended.  With  all  my  admiration  for  self-made 
men,  I  am  far  from  considering  them  the  best  made  men. 
Their  symmetry  is  often  marred  by  the  effects  of  their  extra 
exertion.  The  hot  rays  of  the  sun  and  the  long  and  rugged 
road  in  which  they  were  compelled  to  travel  have  left  their 
marks  sometimes  quite  visibly  and  unpleasantly  upon  them. 
While  the  world  values  skill  and  power,  it  values  beauty  and 
polish  as  well.  It  was  not  alone  the  hard  good-sense  and  hon 
est  heart  of  Horace  Greeley,  the  self-made  man,  that  made  the 
4  New  York  Tribune,'  but  likewise  the  brilliant  and  thoroughly 
educated  men  silently  associated  with  him.  There  was  never 
a  self-educated  man,  however  wrell  educated,  who,  with  the 
same  exertion,  would  not  have  been  better  educated  by  the  aid 
of  schools.  It  must  be  admitted  that  self-made  men  are  not 
generally  over-modest  or  self-forgetful  men.  Perhaps  the  pe 
culiar  resistance  they  meet  in  asserting  their  pretentions,  may 
account  for  the  loudness  of  their  self-assertion.  The  country 
knows  the  story  of  Andrew  Johnson  by  heart,  and  from  his 
own  lips.  The  very  energies  employed,  the  obstacles  overcome, 
the  heights  to  which  some  men  rise,  and  the  broad  contrasts 
which  life  forces  upon  them  at  every  step  tend  to  make  them 
egotistical.  A  man  indebted  to  himself  for  himself,  may  natur 
ally  think  well  of  himself.  But  this  thing  may  be  far  overdone. 
That  a  man  has  been  able  to  make  his  own  way  in  the  world, 
is  an  humble  fact  as  well  as  an  honorable  one.  It  is,  however, 
possible  to  state  a  very  humble  fact  in  a  very  haughty  manner, 
and  self-made  men  are,  as  a  class,  much  addicted  to  this  vice. 
In  this  respect  they  make  themselves  much  less  agreeable  to 
society  than  they  might  otherwise  be.  One  other  criticism  is 
often  very  properly  made  upon  these  men.  Never  having  en 
joyed  the  benefits  of  schools,  colleges,  and  other  institutions  of 
learning,  they  display  a  contempt  for  them  which  is  quite  ridic 
ulous.  A  man  may  know  much  about  educating  himself,  and 


"  BEWARE  OF  A  YANKEE  WHEN  HE  IS  FEEDING."      255 

little  about  the  proper  means  of  educating  others.  He  may 
be  remarkably  large  but  somewhat  awkward ;  swift  but 
ungraceful ;  a  man  of  power  but  deficient  in  the  polish  and 
amiable  proportions  of  the  affluent  and  regularly  educated  man. 
Generally,  I  think,  self-made  men  answer  this  description." 


CHAPTER     X. 

"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?" 

MR.  DOUGLASS,  himself,  suggested  this  title  for  the 
chapter  about  a  time  when  such  a  question  might 
have  been  asked  by  many  an  Abolitionist  besides 
Sojourner  Truth.  She  interrupted  him  with  it,  as  he 
was  dwelling  upon  the  darkness  of  the  hour  ;  and  he 
replied  :  "  No,  God  is  not  dead  ;  and  therefore  it  is 
that  slavery  must  end  in  blood  !  "  The  warmth  with 
which  the  South  sanctioned  the  outrages  in  Kansas, 
applauded  the  striking  down  of  Summer  in  the  Senate, 
threatened  to  secede  in  case  Fremont  was  elected, 
and  demanded  the  re-opening  of  the  slave-trade, 
showed  plainly  that  war  might  soon  break  out  ;  and 
the  failure  of  the  Republicans  to  carry  Pennsylvania, 
New  Jersey,  Illinois,  Indiana,  and  California,  even  on 
these  plain  and  urgent  issues,  made  it  seem  not  un 
likely  that  the  contest  would  be  between  a  united 
South  and  a  divided  North.  War  must  come  ;  but 
would  it  abolish  or  perpetuate  slavery  ?  This  ques 
tion  could  not  always  be  answered  confidently  ;  and 
Douglass  was  once  hard  at  work  in  his  sanctum  in 
Rochester,  mailing  copies  of  his  paper,  and  thinking 
gloomily  of  the  future,  when  Beecher  came  in  and 
asked  him,  what  he  thought  of  the  prospects  of  the 
cause.  "All  is  lost,"  was  the  reply.  "No,"  said  the 
preacher,  "  God  reigns  !  Sit  down  beside  me,  and  let 

256 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?"  257 

me  talk  to  you."  Talk  he  did  for  twenty  minutes, 
about  what  might  yet  be  hoped  from  the  divine  jus 
tice  ;  and  when  he  went  away,  he  left  his  friend  so 
much  encouraged  as  to  be  almost  a  new  creature. 

There  was  not  a  bit  of  cowardice  in  the  spirit  in 
which  the  champion  of  his  race  took  the  heavy  blow 
dealt  at  it  in  the  Dred  Scott  decision.  In  the  speech 
which  was  prepared  for  the  meeting  at  New  York,  in 
May,  1857,  of  those  Abolitionists  who  held  slavery  un 
constitutional,  and  was  published  that  year  in  a 
pamphlet,  he  says  : 

"  I  own  myself  not  insensible  to  the  many  difficulties  and  dis 
couragements  that  beset  us  on  every  hand.  They  fling  their 
broad  and  gloomy  shadows  across  the  pathway  of  every  thought 
ful  colored  man  in  this  country.  For  one,  I  see  them  clearly 
and  feel  them  sadly.  Standing,  as  it  were,  barefoot,  and 
treading  upon  the  sharp  and  flinty  rocks  of  the  present,  and 
looking  out  upon  the  boundless  sea  of  the  future,  I  have  sought 
in  my  humble  way  to  penetrate  the  intervening  mists  and  clouds, 
and  perchance  to  descry  in  the  dim  and  shadowy  distance  the 
white  flag  of  freedom,  the  precise  speck  of  time  at  which  the 
•  cruel  bondage  of  my  people  should  end,  and  the  long  entombed 
millions  rise  from  the  foul  grave  of  slavery  and  death.  But 
of  that  time  I  can  know  nothing,  and  you  can  know  nothing. 
All  is  uncertain  at  that  point."  ...  "  We  are  told,  in  tones 
of  lofty  exultation,  that  the  day  is  lost,  all  lost ;  and  that  we 
might  as  well  give  up  the  struggle.  The  highest  authority  has 
spoken.  The  voice  of  the  Supreme  Court  has  gone  out  over 
the  troubled  waves  of  the  national  conscience,  saying,  '  Peace, 
be  still ! '  This  infamous  decision  of  the  slave-holding  wing  of 
the  Supreme  Court  maintains  "  .  .  .  "  that  slaves  are  property 
in  the  same  sense  that  horses,  sheep,  and  cattle  are  property ; " 
.  .  .  "that  the  right  of  the  slave-holder  to  his  slave  does  not 
depend  upon  the  local  law,  but  is  secured  wherever  the  Constitu 
tion  of  the  United  States  extends  ;  that  Congress  has  no  power  to 


258  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

prohibit  slavery  anywhere;  that  slavery  may  go  in  safety  anywhere 
under  the  star-spangled  banner  ;  that  colored  persons  of  African 
descent  have  no  rights  that  white  men  are  bound  to  respect." 

He  might  be  asked  how  he  is  affected  by  "  this 
judicial  incarnation  of  wolfishness  ;  "  and  he  would 
answer  : 

"  My  hopes  were  never  brighter  than  now.  I  have  no  fear 
that  the  national  conscience  will  be  put  to  sleep  by  such  an 
open,  glaring,  and  scandalous  tissue  of  lies  as  that  is,  and  has 
been,  over  and  over  again,  shown  to  be.  The  Supreme  Court 
of  the  United  States  is  not  the  only  power  in  this  world.  It  is 
very  great ;  but  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  Almighty  is  greater. 
Judge  Taney  may  do  many  things,  but  he  cannot  perform 
impossibilities.  He  cannot  bail  out  the  ocean,  annihilate  this 
firm,  old  earth,  or  pluck  the  silvery  star  of  liberty  from  our 
Northern  sky.  He  may  decide,  and  decide  again ;  but  he  can 
not  reverse  the  decision  of  the  Most  High."  ...  "  Man's 
right  to  liberty  is  self-evident."  ...  "To  decide  against  this 
right  in  the  person  of  Dred  Scott "  ..."  is  to  decide  against 
God."  ...  "  It  is  an  attempt  to  undo  what  God  has  done, 
to  blot  out  the  broad  distinction  instituted  by  the  Allwise,  be 
tween  men  and  things,  and  to  change  the  image  and  superscrip 
tion  of  the  ever  living  God  into  a  speechless  piece  of  merchan 
dise."  ...  "In  one  point  of  view,  we,  the  Abolitionists  and 
colored  people,  should  meet  this  decision,  uncalled  for  and 
monstrous  as  it  seems,  in  a  cheerful  spirit.  This  very  attempt 
to  blot  out  forever  the  hope  of  an  enslaved  people  may  be  one 
necessary  link  in  the  chain  of  events  preparatory  to  the  down 
fall  .and  complete  overthrow  of  the  whole  slave  system.  The 
whole  history  of  the  anti-slavery  movement  is  studded  with 
proof,  that  all  measures,  devised  and  executed  with  a  view  to 
allay  and  diminish  the  anti-slavery  agitation,  have  only  served 
to  increase, embolden,  and  intensify  that  agitation."  ...  "It 
was  so  with  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill ;  it  was  so  with  the  Kansas- 
Nebraska  Bill ;  and  it  will  be  so  with  this  last  and  most  shock- 


"IS    GOD    DEAD?"  259 

ing  of  all  pro-slavery  devices,  this  Taney  decision."  .  .  . 
"  Come  what  will,  I  hold  it  to  be  morally  certain  that,  sooner  or 
later,  by  fair  means,  or  foul  means,  in  peace  or  in  blood,  in  judg 
ment  or  in  mercy,  slavery  is  doomed  to  cease  out  of  this  other 
wise  goodly  land,  and  liberty  is  destined  to  become  the  settled 
law  of  this  Republic." 

As  a  justification  for  this  view  he  appeals  to  the 
tendencies  of  the  age,  and  the  character  of  the  Ameri 
can  people,  and  also  to  the  fact  that  colored  people 
were  citizens  of  several  of  the  States  which  formed 
the  Constitution,  and  were  therefore  entitled  to  the 
protection  which  it  confers.  He  insists  on  the  anti- 
slavery  character  of  the  Constitution,  when  rightly 
interpreted,  and  challenges  any  one  who  differs  from 
him  to  say  in  what  particular  that  instrument  sanc 
tions  oppression  : 

"  Where  will  he  find  a  guarantee  for  slavery  ?  Will  he  find 
it  in  the  declaration  that  no  person  shall  be  deprived  of  life, 
liberty,  or  property,  without  due  process  of  law  ?  Will  he  find 
it  in  the  declaration  that  the  Constitution  was  established  to 
secure  the  blessings  of  liberty  ?  Will  he  find  it  in  the  right  of 
the  people  to  be  secure  in  their  persons,  and  papers,  and  houses, 
and  effects  ?  Will  he  find  it  in  the  clause,  prohibiting  the  enact 
ment  by  any  State  of  a  bill  of  attainder  ?  These  all  strike  at 
the  root  of  slavery,  and  any  one  of  them,  but  faithfully  carried 
out,  would  put  an  end  to  slavery  in  every  State  in  the  Ameri 
can  Union." 

This  speech  also  contains  the  only  verses  of  his 
which  I  have  read  ;  but  they  are  not  so  good  as  his 
prose.  There  is  power,  though,  in  this  line  : 

"  The  pathway  of  tyrants  lies  over  volcanoes." 
On   August  4,  he  spoke  at  Canandaigua,  as   he  had 


260  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

done  there  ten  years  and  three  days  before,  at  the 
celebration  of  Emancipation  in  the  West  Indies.  This 
speech  was  published  in  the  same  pamphlet  with  that 
on  the  Dred  Scott  decision.  He  complains  justly 
that  the  white  people  in  the  United  States  had  never 
shown  any  general  appreciation  of  the  grandeur  of 
this  act,  and  did  not  even  then  appear  to  care  any 
thing  for  the  improvement  of  the  morality,  intelli 
gence,  and  happiness  of  the  freedman.  The  only 
question  asked,  even  at  the  North,  was  still,  "  Did  it 
pay  ?  "  He  left  the  task  of  answering  that  question 
to  Dr.  Garnett,  who  was  on  the  platform,  and  himself 
took  the  opportunity  to  give  his  hearers  some  timely 
advice,  as  follows  : 

"  I  know,  my  friends,  that  in  some  quarters  the  efforts  of  col 
ored  people  meet  with  very  little  encouragement.  We  may  fight ; 
but  we  must  fight  like  the  Sepoys  of  India,  under  the  white 
officers.  This  class  of  Abolitionists  don't  like  colored  anti- 
slavery  fairs  for  the  support  of  colored  newspapers.  They 
don't  like  any  demonstrations  whatever  in  which  colored  men 
take  a  leading  part.  They  talk  of  the  proud  Anglo-Saxon 
blood  as  flippantly  as  those  who  profess  to  believe  in  the 
natural  inferiority  of  races.  Your  humble  speaker  has  been 
branded  as  an  ingrate,  because  he  has  ventured  to  stand  up  on 
his  own  right  and  to  plead  our  common  cause  as  a  colored 
man,  rather  than  as  a  Garrisonian.  I  hold  it  to  be  no  part  of 
gratitude  to  allow  our  white  friends  to  do  all  the  work,  while 
we  merely  hold  their  coats.  Opposition  of  the  sort  now  re 
ferred  to,  is  partisan  opposition  ;  and  we  need  not  mind 
it.  The  white  people  at  large  will  not  be  largely  influenced  by 
it.  They  will  see  and  appreciate  all  honest  efforts  on  our  part 
to  improve  our  condition  as  a  people.  Let  me  give  you  a 
word  of  the  philosophy  of  reform.  The  whole  history  of  the 
progress  of  human  liberty  shows  that  all  concessions,  yet  made 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?"  261 

to  her  august  claims,  have  been  born  of  earnest  struggle.  The 
conflict  has  been  exciting,  agitating,  all-absorbing,  and  for  the 
time  being  putting  all  other  tumults  to  silence.  It  must  do 
this,  or  it  does  nothing.  If  there  is  no  struggle,  there  is  no  prog 
ress.  Those  who  profess  to  favor  freedom,  and  yet  deprecate 
agitation,  are  men  who  want  crops  without  plowing  up  the 
ground.  They  want  rain  without  thunder  and  lightning.  They 
want  the  ocean  without  the  awful  roar  of  its  many  waters. 
This  struggle  may  be  a  moral  one  ;  or  it  may  be  a  physical  one  ; 
or  it  may  be  both  moral  and  physical ;  but  it  must  be  a  struggle. 
Power  concedes  nothing  without  a  demand.  It  never  did,  and 
it  never  will.  Find  out  just  what  people  will  submit  to,  and 
you  have  found  out  the  exact  amount  of  injustice  and  wrong 
which  will  be  imposed  upon  them  ;  and  these  will  continue  till 
they  are  resisted  with  either  words  or  blows,  or  with  both. 
The  limits  of  tyrants  are  prescribed  by  the  endurance  of  those 
whom  they  oppress.  In  the  light  of  these  ideas,  negroes  will 
be  hunted  at  the  North,  and  held  and  flogged  at  the  South,  so 
long  as  they  submit  to  those  devilish  outrages,  and  make  no 
resistance,  either  moral  or  physical.  Men  may  not  get  all  they 
pay  for  in  this  world  ;  but  they  must  certainly  pay  for  all  they 
get.  If  we  ever  get  free  from  all  the  oppressions  and  wrongs 
heaped  upon  us,  we  must  pay  for  their  removal.  We  must  do 
this  by  labor,  by  suffering,  by  sacrifice,  and,  if  needs  be,  by  our 
lives  and  the  lives  of  others." 

I  cannot  say  precisely  what  he  did  in  1858  to  justify 
Miss  Assing's  statement  that  he  "  has  spoken  for  sev 
enteen  years,  but  never  repeated  himself,  nor  lost  his 
hold  upon  his  audience.  In  all  the  North  there  is  no 
city  or  village  where  the  announcement  of  his  name 
will  not  fill  every  place  in  the  hall."  Neither  the 
woman's  cause  nor  the  slave's  found  in  him  a  luke 
warm  advocate,  however  ;  and  it  was  in  this  year 
that  a  little  magazine,  called  "  Douglass's  Monthly," 
and  designed  especially  for  circulation  in  England, 


262  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

made  its  first  appearance.  The  first  number  was  that 
for  June  ;  the  price  was  five  shillings  a  year  ;  and  Miss 
Griffiths,  then  in  England,  where  she  was  married  to 
Dr.  Crofts,  was  a  valuable  contributor.  The  weekly 
paper,  it  may  here  be  added,  was  merged  in  the 
"  Monthly  "  in  August,  1860. 

The  most  important  events  in  the  life  of  Douglass 
in  1858  were  not  publicly  known  before  October, 
1859.  During  the  latter  part  of  1847  ne  nad  spent  a 
night  in  Springfield,  Massachusetts,  as  the  guest  of 
John  Brown,  of  whom  there  is  a  graphic  account  in 
the  "Life  and  Times,"  (pp.  309-311).  The  conver 
sation  which  then  took  place  is  related  thus  in  an 
unpublished  lecture  by  Douglass  : 

"  He  touched  my  vanity  at  the  outset,  in  this  wise  :  '  I  have,' 
he  said,  '  been  looking  over  your  people  during  the  last  twenty 
years,  watching  and  waiting  for  heads  to  rise  above  the  surface, 
to  whom  I  could  safely  impart  my  views  and  plans.  At  times 
I  have  been  most  discouraged,  but  lately  I  have  seen  a  good 
many  heads  popping  up,  and  whenever  I  see  them,  I  try  to  put 
myself  in  communication  with  them.'  John  Brown's  plan,  as  it 
was  then  formed  in  his  mind,  was  very  simple,  and  had  much 
to  commend  it.  It  did  not,  as  some  suppose,  directly  contem 
plate  a  general  uprising  among  the  slaves,  and  a  general  slaugh 
ter  of  the  slave-masters,  but  it  did  contemplate  the  creation  of  an 
armed  force,  which  should  constantly  act  against  slavery  in  the 
heart  of  the  South.  He  called  my  attention  to  a  large  map  upon 
the  wall,  and  pointed  out  to  me  the  far-reaching  Alleghanies, 
stretching  away  from  New  York  into  the  Southern  States. 
'  These  mountains,'  he  said,  '  are  the  basis  of  my  plan.  God 
has  given  the  strength  of  these  hills  to  freedom.  They  were 
placed  here  by  the  Almighty  for  the  emancipation  of  your  race. 
They  are  full  of  natural  forts,  where  one  man  for  defense  will 
be  equal  to  a  hundred  for  attack.  They  are  full  of  good  hiding 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?  "  263 

places,  where  a  large  number  of  brave  men  could  be  concealed 
and  for  a  long  time  baffle  and  elude  pursuit.  I  know  these 
mountains  well,  and  could  take  a  body  of  men  into  them,  and 
keep  them  there,  despite  all  the  efforts  Virginia  could  make  to 
dislodge  and  drive  me  out  of  them.  My  plan,  then,  is  this :  to 
take  about  twenty-five  brave  men  into  those  mountains,  and 
begin  my  work  on  a  small  scale,  supply  them  with  arms  and 
provisions,  and  post  them  in  companies  of  fives  on  a  line  of 
twenty-five  miles.  These  shall  for  a  time  busy  themselves 
in  gathering  recruits  from  the  neighboring  farms,  seeking  and 
selecting  the  most  daring  and  restless  spirits  first.'  In  this 
part  of  the  work,  he  said,  the  utmost  care  was  to  be  taken  to 
avoid  treachery  and  discovery.  Only  the  most  conscientious 
and  skillful  of  his  men  were  to  be  detailed  for  this  perilous 
duty.  With  care  and  enterprise,  he  thought,  he  could  soon 
gather  a  force  of  one  hundred  hardy  men,  who  would  be  con 
tent  to  lead  the  free  and  adventurous  life  to  which  he  proposed 
to  train  them.  When  once  properly  drilled,  and  each  man  had 
found  the  place  for  which  he  was  best  suited,  they  would  begin 
the  work  in  earnest.  They  would  run  off  the  slaves  in  large 
numbers.  They  would  retain  the  strong  and  brave,  and  send 
the  weak  ones  to  the  North  by  the  underground  railroad.  His 
operations  would  be  enlarged  with  the  increasing  number  of  his 
men,  and  they  would  not  be  confined  to  one  locality.  He  would 
approach  the  slave-holders  in  some  cases  at  midnight,  and  tell 
them  they  must  give  up  their  slaves,  and  also  let  them  have 
their  best  horses  upon  which  to  ride  away.  Slavery,  he  said, 
was  a  state  of  war,  in  which  the  slaves  were  unwilling  parties, 
and  that  they,  therefore,  had  a  right  to  anything  necessary  to 
their  peace  and  freedom.  He  would  shed  no  blood,  and  would 
avoid  a  fight,  except  when  he  could  not  escape  from  it  and  was 
compelled  to  do  it  in  self-defense.  He  would  then,  of  course, 
do  his  best.  This  movement,  he  said,  would  weaken  slavery  in 
two  ways.  First,  by  making  slave  property  insecure,  it  would 
make  such  property  undesirable.  Secondly,  it  would  keep  the 
anti-slavery  agitation  alive,  and  public  attention  fixed  upon  the 
subject,  and  thus  finally  lead  to  the  adoption  of  measures  for 


264  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

abolishing  the  slave  system  altogether.  He  held  that  the  anti- 
slavery  agitation  was  in  danger  of  dying  out,  and  that  it  needed 
some  such  startling  measures,  as  he  proposed,  to  keep  it  alive 
and  effective.  Slavery,  he  said,  had  nearly  been  abolished  in 
Virginia  by  the  Nat.  Turner  insurrection ;  and  he  thought  his 
plan  of  operation  would  speedily  abolish  it  in  both  Maryland 
and  Virginia.  He  said  his  trouble  was  to  get  the  right  kind  of 
men  with  which  to  begin  the  work,  and  the  means  necessary 
to  equip  them.  And  here  he  explained  the  reason  for  his  sim 
ple  mode  of  living,  his  plain  dress,  his  leather  stock.  He  had 
adopted  this  economy  in  order  to  save  money  with  which  to 
arm  and  equip  men  to  carry  out  his  plan  of  liberation.  This 
was  said  by  him  in  no  boastful  terms.  On  the  contrary,  he  said 
he  had  already  delayed  his  work  too  long,  and  that  he  had  no 
room  to  boast  either  his  zeal  or  his  self-denial.  From  eight 
o'clock  in  the  evening  till  three  o'clock  in  the  morning,  Captain 
John  Brown  and  I  sat  face  to  face,  he  arguing  in  favor  of  his 
plan,  and  I  finding  all  the  objections  I  could  against  it.  Now 
mark  !  This  conversation  took  place  fully  twelve  years  before 
the  blow  was  struck  at  Harper's  Ferry,  and  his  plan  was  even 
then  more  than  twenty  years  old.  He  had,  therefore,  been 
watching  and  waiting  all  these  years  for  suitable  heads  to  rise 
up,  or  '  pop  up,'  to  use  his  expression,  among  the  sable  millions, 
to  whom  he  could  safely  confide  his  plan,  and  thus  nearly  forty 
years  had  passed  between  this  man's  thoughts  and  his  act." 

One  of  the  objections  then  made  by  Douglass 
seems  very  shrewd,  namely,  that  it  would  be  difficult 
for  the  band  to  find  provisions.  A  somewhat  similar 
attempt,  made  in  the  Alps  by  Dolcino,  during  the 
Middle  Ages,  failed  from  just  this  cause.  The  fa 
natics  cut  all  who  first  met  them  to  pieces  ;  but  they 
could  not  collect  food  enough  to  save  themselves 
from  being  ultimately  so  reduced  by  starvation,  as  to 
fall  an  easy  prey.  This  would,  I  fear,  have  been  the 
fate  of  John  Brown,  if  he  had  not  been  crushed  by 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?"  265 

superior  numbers  at  once,  as  actually  took  place. 
The  plan  which  he  finally  adopted  was  far  worse  than 
the  original  one  ;  but  I  do  not  think  that  he  would, 
under  any  circumstances,  have  been  able  to  gather 
recruits  among  the  slaves  fast  enough  to  prevent  be 
ing  captured  by  the  masters  ;  and  if  he  had  succeeded 
in  making  his  mountain-camp  strong  enough  to  resist 
all  other  enemies,  he  would  certainly  have  been  con 
quered  by  famine.  It  is  by  no  means  strange  that 
Brown  and  other  Northerners,  who  judged  of  the 
slaves  mainly  from  fugitives  like  Douglass  and 
Craft,  imagined  they  would  be  more  willing  to  rise  in 
revolt  than  proved  to  be  the  case,  either  at  Harper's 
Ferry  or  during  the  war  ;  but  Douglass  himself  must 
have  understood  the  temper  of  the  men  among  whom 
he  had  been  brought  up.  I  suspect  that  in  his  relations 
with  Brown,  as  well  as  those  previously  with  O'Con- 
nell,  and  afterwards  with  Butler,  he  allowed  his  sym 
pathy  with  a  benefactor  of  his  race  to  carry  him 
beyond  what  would  have  been  approved  by  his  own 
impartial  judgment. 

One  of  Brown's  objects,  it  should  be  remembered, 
was  to  increase  the  agitation  about  slavery  ;  and  this 
was  much  more  desirable  in  1847  than  in  1859. 
Almost  anything  would  have  been  allowable  to 
arouse  the  North,  while  it  remained  in  apathy  ;  but  the 
aggressions  of  the  South  had,  before  1859,  stirred  up 
so  much  opposition  as  to  make  nothing  more  neces 
sary  than  that  the  Republican  President  should  be 
elected  by  an  overwhelming  majority,  and  that  any 
attempt  at  secession  should  be  put  down  by  a  united 
North.  That  no  such  attempt  as  was  first  planned, 
or  ultimately  made,  by  John  Brown  could  then  have 


266  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

promoted  the  attainment  of  these  objects  will,  I  hope, 
be  plain  enough  as  we  go  on.  Let  me  only  add  that 
I  go  thus  fully  into  the  matter,  because  it  is  due  to 
Mr.  Douglass  that  he  should  be  freed  from  blame 
which  has  been  cast  upon  him,  for  not  going  to  Har 
per's  Ferry. 

He  did  assent  to  the  original  plan,  proposed  by  a 
man,  "  whose  mission  seemed  to  him  the  only  apology 
for  his  existence,"  and  whose  conviction  was  that 
"  He  had  no  better  use  for  his  life."  "I  have  talked 
with  many  men  upon  the  subject  of  slavery,"  says  our 
lecturer,  "  but  I  remember  no  one  who  seemed  so 
deeply  excited  upon  that  subject  as  Captain  John 
Brown.  He  would  walk  the  room  with  agitation  at 
the  mention  of  slavery.  He  saw  the  evil  through  no 
mist,  haze,  or  clouds,  but  in  a  broad  light  of  infinite 
brightness,  which  left  no  line  of  its  ten  thousand 
horrors  out  of  sight."  ...  "  His  zeal  in  the  cause  of 
freedom  was  infinitely  superior  to  mine.  Mine  was 
as  the  taper  light  :  his  was  as  the  burning  sun.  Mine 
was  bounded  by  time  :  his  stretched  away  to  the 
silent  shores  of  eternity.  I  could  speak  for  the  slave  : 
John  Brown  could  fight  for  the  slave.  I  could  live 
for  the  slave  :  John  Brown  could  die  for  the  slave." 

"  I  not  only  did  not  aspire  to  the  crown  of  martyr 
dom  ;  but  I  never  prompted  such  aspirations  on  his 
part,"  adds  Mr.  Douglass.  He  was  much  more  fully 
in  sympathy  with  the  struggle  in  Kansas,  and  often 
got  up  public  meetings  which  sent  out  money  to  help 
Captain  Brown  fight  against  border-ruffians.  Their 
defeat  made  it  possible  for  the  hero  to  get  the  men 
and  money  he  needed  for  Virginia  ;  and  in  January, 
1858,  he  came  to  his  friend  in  Rochester,  and  told 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?  "  267 

him  that  he  wanted  to  spend  several  weeks  with  him, 
but  would  not  stop  unless  he  could  be  allowed  to  pay 
board.  Douglass  was  glad  to  have  him  there,  but 
had  to  take  him  on  his  own  terms.  There  he  stayed 
until  late  in  February,  employing  part  of  his  time  in 
making  out  a  constitution  for  the  mountain-camp, 
and  part  in  writing  letters  to  Gerrit  Smith,  Mr. 
George  L.  Stearns,  of  Boston,  and  other  friendly  Abol 
itionists.  His  men  were  already  drilling  in  Iowa  ; 
but  he  was  in  urgent  need  of  money.  He  spoke  now 
and  then  of  the  government  arsenal  at  Harper's  Ferry 
as  a  place  where  he  could  get  weapons ;  but  he 
seemed  much  more  intent  on  plans  for  fortifications 
in  the  Alleghanies.  He  had  so  much  to  say  about 
his  plans,  that  they  soon  ceased  to  interest  any  one  in 
the  house,  except  the  children,  one  of  whom  now 
says  :  "  The  sun  seemed  to  rise  and  set  to  me  in  John 
Brown." 

From  Rochester  he  went  to  Peterboro,  where  he 
met  Gerrit  Smith,  Mr.  Sanborn,  and  Mr.  Morton,  on 
February  22.  His  friends  tried  to  shake  his  purpose, 
but  found  him  bent  upon  it,  and  finally  concluded 
that,  as  the  attempt  would  probably  be  made  at  all 
events,  they  had  better  have  it  a  success.  Stearns, 
Parker,  Dr.  Howe,  and  Higginson  were  of  the  same 
opinion  in  Boston  ;  but  Brown  could  get  nothing 
more  than  a  positive  refusal  out  of  Phillips  and  Garri 
son  ;  and  these  latter  seem  to  me  to  have  taken  the 
wisest  and  kindest  course.  From  Boston  the  Captain 
went  on  to  Philadelphia,  where,  on  March  10,  he 
met  several  leaders  of  the  colored  people,  including 
Douglass,  who  had,  I  presume,  made  an  engagement 
to  lecture  as  a  pretext  for  the  journey.  That  winter, 


268  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Brown  led  the  most  successful  of  his  many  expedi 
tions,  that  which  set  free  eleven  slaves  in  Missouri 
and  carried  them  to  Canada.  On  July  4,  1859,  he  was 
at  Harper's  Ferry,  where  he  hired  the  farm  to  which 
his  men  and  weapons  were  soon  brought. 

Douglass,  meantime,  had  been  hard  at  work  as 
editor  and  lecturer.  That  spring  he  spoke  in  about 
twenty  cities  in  Michigan,  Illinois,  and  Wisconsin. 
A  reception  was  given  him,  on  February  i,  in 
Chicago,  where  he  told  about  "  Self-made  Men  ;  "  and 
his  whole  trip  was  a  pleasant  one,  except  at  Janes- 
ville.  There  he  and  the  two  colored  men  who  accom 
panied  him  were  put  at  a  table  by  themselves,  in  full 
view  of  all  the  rowdies  in  the  bar-room.  Douglass 
soon  said,  loud  enough  to  be  heard  by  all  the  crowd, 
that  he  had  made  a  great  discovery  in  the  stable. 
"  I  saw  black  and  white  horses  eating  there  in  peace, 
out  of  the  same  trough  ;  and  I  infer  that  the  horses 
in  Janesville  are  more  civilized  than  the  people." 
The  by-standers  laughed  good-naturedly  ;  and  there 
was  no  color-line  across  that  dining-room  afterwards. 
May  12,  1859,  we  find  him  delivering  a  eulogy  on 
Judge  William  Jay,  an  early  advocate  of  immediate 
emancipation  in  the  District  of  Columbia.  This  ad 
dress,  which  was  prepared  by  the  invitation  of  the 
colored  citizens  of  New  York  City,  was  printed  that 
year  in  pamphlet  form,  and  seems  to  me  his  most 
scholarly  production.  The  amount  of  information  is 
ample  and  the  arrangement  judicious,  while  the  ele 
vation  of  the  author's  views  at  this  time  appears  in 
the  following  passage  : 

"  The  subject  of  slavery  is  an   exciting  one.     Oppression  is 
apt  even    to   make  a   wise  man  mad.     The    bare  relation  of 


"IS    GOD    DEAD?"  269 

master  and  slave,  unaccompanied  by  its  grosser  manifestations 
of  ignorance,  depravity,  cruelty,  and  blood,  shocks  and  stuns  the 
mind  by  its  deformity.  O'Connell  used  to  say,  that  when  he 
first  heard  the  idea  of  property  in  man,  it  sounded  to  him  as  if 
some  one  was  stamping  upon  the  grave  of  his  mother.  The  very 
thought  chills  the  blood  in  the  veins  of  the  strong  man,  and 
stirs  a  fever  in'the  blood  of  the  age.  The  heart  becomes  sick 
and  the  spirit  frantic  with  horror  over  its  brutal  atrocities  and 
crimes.  In  writing  upon  a  system  of  such  boundless  and  start 
ling  enormity,  where  the  wildest  fancy  is  overmatched  by  the 
terrible  reality,  it  is  not  easy  to  steer  clear  of  exaggeration  in 
individual  cases.  Some  extravagance  may,  indeed  be  looked 
for  and  excused  in  treating  of  such  a  subject ;  but  such  extrava 
gance  will  be  looked  for  in  vain  in  the  writings  of  Judge  Jay  on 
slavery.  As  a  writer  that  can  be  said  of  him,  which  can  be 
said  of  but  few  reformatory  writers  in  any  age  :  he  not  only  re 
lied  implicitly  upon  and  believed  in  the  simple,  undistorted 
truth,  as  the  safest  and  best  means  of  accomplishing  his  benev 
olent  purposes,  but  was  never,  to  the  knowledge  of  any,  tempted 
or  driven  by  eager  anxiety  for  immediate  results  into  distor 
tion  or  exaggeration.  He  had  an  earnest  heart.  It  was  al 
ways  alive  with  the  fires  of  justice  and  liberty  ;  but  with  all, 
he  possessed  that  accurate  and  well-balanced  judgment  which 
controlled  and  directed  wisely  and  discreetly  all  his  workings  on 
the  subject  of  slavery.  No  fact,  no  statement  of  Judge  Jay, 
how  fiercely  soever  his  opinicns  may  have  been  combated,  has 
ever  been  called  in  question."  .  .  . 

Douglass  spoke  this  year  on  the  anniversary  of 
emancipation  in  the  West  Indies,  at  Geneva,  New 
York,  in  company  with  Dr.  Cheever,  whose  attempt 
to  start  a  movement  within  the  Church  against  slav 
ery,  was  cordially  praised  in  "  Douglass's  Monthly." 
A  few  days  later  came  a  summons  which  brought 
Douglass  to  his  last  meeting  with  John  Brown,  on 
Saturday,  August  20.  It  was,  as  the  lecturer  says  : 


270  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

"  In  an  old  stone  quarry  on  the  Conecochege,  near  the  town 
of  Chambersburg,  Pennsylvania.  His  arms  and  ammunition 
were  stored  in  that  town,  and  were  to  be  moved  on  the  night 
of  our  meeting  to  Harper's  Ferry.  In  company  with  Shields 
Green,  I  obeyed  the  summons.  Prompt  to  the  hour  we  met  the 
old  Captain  at  the  appointed  time  and  place.  He  was  accom 
panied  by  Mr.  Kagai,  his  secretary.  Our  meeting  was,  in  some 
sense,  a  council  of  war.  Until  that  night  I  did  not  know  that 
Captain  Brown  meant  to  depart  from  his  old  plan,  already 
explained.  We  spent  that  night  and  the  succeeding  Sunday 
in  conference  on  the  question,  whether  the  meditated  blow  at 
Harper's  Ferry  should  be  struck,  or  whether  the  old  plan  before 
described  should  be  the  one  pursued.  Captain  Brown  was  for 
boldly  striking  Harper's  Ferry  at  once,  and  running  the  risk  of 
getting  into  the  mountains  afterward.  Shields  Green,  who 
had  come  down  with  me,  and  Mr.  Kagai  remained  silent  and 
continued  listeners  to  the  discussion  throughout,  never  ventur 
ing  a  word.  It  is  needless  to  repeat  here  what  was  said — after 
what  has  happened.  Suffice  it  to  say  that,  notwithstanding  all 
I  could  urge,  my  old  friend  Brown  had  resolved  upon  his  course  ; 
and  it  was  idle  to  parley  longer.  I  told  him  at  last,  that  he  was 
going  into  a  steel  trap,  and  that  it  was  impossible  for  me  to 
join  him.  He  regretted  my  decision  ;  and  we  parted,  he  going 
to  Harper's  Ferry,  and  I  going  to  Rochester.  Thus  far  I  have 
spoken  exclusively  of  Captain  Brown.  Let  me  say  a  word  now 
of  his  brave  and  devoted  followers.  Time  fails  me  to  do  more 
than  this.  And  first,  a  word  of  Shields  Green,  the  young  man 
who  accompanied  me  to  meet  John  Brown  in  the  old  stone 
quarry  at  Chambersburg.  This  man  was,  at  that  time,  only  a 
year  from  slavery  in  South  Carolina.  His  love  of  liberty  and 
hatred  of  slavery  were  attested  by  his  escape  from  Charleston, 
and  finding  his  way  through  innumerable  dangers,  to  Rochester, 
where  he  lived  in  my  family,  and  where  he  met  the  man  with 
whom  he  bravely  went  to  the  scaffold.  I  said  to  him,  when 
about  to  leave  Captain  Brown,  '  Now,  Shields,  you  have  heard 
our  discussion.  If,  in  view  of  it,  you  do  not  wish  to  go  to  Har 
per's  Ferry,  you  have  but  to  say  so,  and  you  may  go  back  with 


11  IS    GOD    DEAD  f  271 

me  to  Rochester.'  He  answered  ;  '  I  believe  I  will  go  with 
the  old  man  ; '  and  go  with  the  old  man  he  did,  and  bore  him 
self  as  bravely  and  grandly  as  any  of  the  number.  He  went 
with  him  into  the  fight,  and  to  the  gallows,  without  a  murmur. 
When  Captain  Brown  was  surrounded  and  at  the  mercy  of  the 
enemy,  and  all  chances  of  escape  were  cut  off,  this  man, 
Green,  was  already  free  and  abroad  in  the  mountains,  with 
Osborn  Anderson,  and  could,  like  Anderson,  have  made  his 
escape.  When  asked  to  do  so,  however,  he  said,  '  No  !  I  will 
go  down  to  the  old  man.'  When  in  prison  in  Charleston,  he 
could  not  see  his  old  friend,  but  to  those  who  spoke  to  him  of 
the  trouble  brought  upon  him,  he  repeatedly  said,  '-I  have  no 
complaint  to  make  against  the  old  man.'  If  a  monument  is 
erected  to  John  Brown,  and  one  ought  to  be,  the  name  and  fig 
ure  of  Shields  Green  should  have  a  conspicuous  place  upon 
that  monument,  for  he  was  true  to  the  '  old  man,  'when  his  cause 
was  most  desperate,  and  in  the  face  of  a  death  upon  the  gal 
lows." 

We  also  read  that,  at  parting,  John  Brown  "  put 
his  arms  around  me,  in  a  manner  more  than  friendly, 
and  said  :  '  Come  with  me,  Douglass,  I  will  defend 
you  with  my  life.  I  want  you  for  a  special  purpose. 
When  I  strike,  the  bees  will  begin  to  swarm  ;  and  I 
shall  want  you  to  help  me  hive  them.'"  He  had 
already  insisted  that  "  The  capture  of  Harper's  Ferry 
would  serve  as  notice  to  the  slaves,  that  their  friends 
had  come,  and  as  a  trumpet  to  rally  them  to  his 
standard."  One  of  the  prisoners,  confined  by  him 
in  the  armory,  Captain  Dangerfield,  says  he  was  sure 
that  "  by  twelve  o'clock  he  would  have  fifteen  hun 
dred  men  with  him,  ready  armed."  He  stated  him 
self  during  the  examination  by  Governor  Wise,  the 
day  after  his  capture,  that,  "  He  confidently  expected 
large  reinforcements."  Writers  have  wondered  why 


272  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

he  stayed  at  Harper's  Ferry  for  twelve  hours  after 
taking  the  town,  with  his  forces  badly  scattered,  and 
without  making  any  preparations  for  a  retreat.  It 
has  also  been  asked,  why  he  was  there  at  all,  espe 
cially  as  the  mountains  in  the  neighborhood  are  not 
particularly  fit  for  guerrilla  warfare.  The  best  ex 
planation,  I  think,  is  that  he  thought  this  stroke 
would  set  the  bees  swarming  ;  and  he  was  waiting  to 
hive  them.  Alas,  few  bees  would  quit  the  old  hive  ; 
and  when  great  swarms  did  darken  the  sky,  they 
were  furious  wasps  and  deadly  hornets. 

His  heroism  in  the  fight  and  the  prison,  at  the  trial 
and  on  the  scaffold,  are  beyond  all  praise.  No  man 
ever  died  more  nobly.  But  morality  is  no  respecter 
of  persons.  Her  authority  ought  not  to  be  thrust 
aside  in  order  to  set  up  heroes  for  worship.  Just 
before  the  anarchists  were  hung  at  Chicago,  I  was 
urged  to  defend  their  conduct,  and  told  that  they 
were  no  worse  than  John  Brown,  and  every  one  ap 
proved  of  what  he  did.  Let  us  see  what  was  thought 
of  it  at  the  time.  Mrs.  Child  wrote  to  Governor 
Wise,  that  no  one  in  her  "  large  circle  of  abolition 
acquaintances "  expected  the  attack  on  Harper's 
Ferry  ;  "  nor  do  I  know  of  a  single  person  who  would 
have  approved  of  it."  Garrison  pronounced  it  "  well 
intended,  but  sadly  misguided."  Whittier  spoke, 
after  the  execution,  of  the  "  guilty  means  "  and  "  the 
folly  which  seeks  through  evil,  good."  The  "Inde 
pendent  "  called  John 'Brown  "a  lawless  brigand." 
The  "  New  York  Tribune's  "  opinion  about  him  and  his 
companions  was  that:  "They  dared  and  died  for 
what  they  felt  to  be  the  right,  though  in  a  manner 
that  seems  to  us  fatally  wrong."  This  was  said  at 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?"  273 

the  first  ;  and  an  editorial  after  the  execution  runs 
thus :  "  Of  course,  we  regard  Brown's  raid  as  utterly 
mistaken,  and  in  its  direct  consequences  pernicious," 
"  a  wrong  way  to  rid  his  country  of  the  curse,"  etc. 
Henry  Wilson  wrote  at  this  time  to  the  "  Liberator," 
from  Natick,  in  reply  to  Henry  G.  Wright,  that  : 

"  Pending  the  recent  election  in  New  York,  I  addressed  thou 
sands  of  people  in  Brooklyn,  Syracuse,  Rome,  Watertown, 
Auburn,  Geneva,  and  other  places,  and  during  the  canvass  of 
two  weeks  everywhere  expressed  my  '  regret  and  condemna 
tion  '  of  his  armed  invasion  of  Virginia ;  and,  during  that  time, 
I  conversed  with  no  one  who  did  not  regret  and  deplore  it. 
And  in  this  State,  and  in  this  town,  where  you  declare  the  peo 
ple  approve  of  Brown's  lawless  act,  I  have  met  few,  very  few 
indeed,  who  approve  that  act.  My  conviction  is  that,  while  the 
people  of  Massachusetts  are  nearly  unanimous  in  their  sympa 
thy  for  the  fate  of  Brown,  and  in  their  admiration  of  his  per 
sonal  heroism,  they  are  quite  unanimous  in  their  regret  and 
condemnation  of  his  lawless  raid  at  Harper's  Ferry." 

Wilson  stated  afterward,  in  his  "  History  of  the 
Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power"  (Vol.  ii,  p.  587), 
that  "  Anti-slavery  men  generally  regretted  and  con 
demned  the  invasion."  The  Republican  platform  of 
1860  declares  that,  "  We  denounce  the  lawless  invasion 
by  armed  force  of  the  soil  of  any  State  or  Territory, 
no  matter  under  what  pretext,  as  among  the  gravest 
of  crimes;"  and  the  candidate,  Abraham  Lincoln, 
said,  in  his  famous  Cooper  Institute  speech,  that  the 
Harper's  Ferry  affair  "  corresponds  with  the  many 
attempts  related  in  history  at  the  assassination  of 
kings  and  emperors.  An  enthusiast  broods  over  the 
oppression  of  a  people,  till  he  fancies  himself  com 
missioned  by  Heaven  to  liberate  them.  He  ventures 


274  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

the  attempt,  which  ends  in  little  else  than  his  own 
execution.  Orsini's  attempt  on  Louis  Napoleon  and 
John  Brown's  attempt  at  Harper's  Ferry  were,  in  their 
philosophy,  precisely  the  same."  John  Brown  gave 
up  his  life  gladly  in  hope  of  freeing  the  oppressed  ; 
so  did  the  men  who  slew  the  Czar,  Alexander  II.  He 
thought  he  was  doing  God  service  ;  and  Paul  thought 
the  same  while  he  was  persecuting  Christianity. 
Persecutors  have  usually  fancied  themselves  in  the 
right,  but  they  have  always  been  in  the  wrong  ;  the 
motives  of  the  revolutionist  are  nobler  than  those  of  the 
persecutor,  but  no  individual  motives  have  as  high 
authority  as  the  eternal  and  universal  principles  of 
morality.  It  is  by  the  standard  of  these  principles  that 
we  must  judge  whether  it  was  right  or  wrong  to  set 
peaceable  citizens  of  our  country  in  deadly  conflict 
amongthemselvesand  finally  against  ourgovernment's 
soldiers,  to  slay  an  unarmed  colored  man  for  trying 
to  give  the  alarm,  and  to  sacrifice  twenty-five  other 
victims.  Who  can  tell  how  many  happy  homes  would 
have  been  made  desolate,  if  John  Brown  could  have 
had  any  part  of  the  success  he  expected  ?  His  attempt 
is  all  the  less  excusable,  because  it  was  made  at  a 
time  when  the  interest  of  the  anti-slavery  cause  de 
manded  that  nothing  should  be  done  to  repel  the 
crowds  of  new  recruits,  who  had  hitherto  been  neu 
tral  or  hostile,  and  that  no  occasion  should  be  given 
for  pretending  that  Abolitionism  was  dangerous  to 
the  country's  permanent  peace  and  welfare.  Nothing 
could  have  better  suited  the  purpose,  either  of  the 
Northerners  who  were  hoping  to  defeat  the  anti-slav 
ery  candidates,  or  of  the  Southerners  who  were  plot 
ting  secession.  The  John  Brown  pike  was  never  flour- 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?  "  275 

ished  so  vigorously  as  by  Democratic  stump-speakers. 
Meeting  after  meeting  of  the  Abolitionists  was  broken 
up  by  such  mobs  as  had  not  been  met  there  since 
1850.  Emerson  was  silenced  in  Boston  for  opinions 
which  had  already  caused  the  withdrawal  of  an  in 
vitation  to  lecture  in  Philadelphia.  How  Douglass 
and  Sanborn  suffered  will  have  to  be  told  more  at 
length.  Among  other  results  of  the  Harper's  Ferry 
tragedy  were  the  expulsion  of  Northern  business  men 
by  the  dozen  from  Southern  cities,  and  the  with 
drawal  of  Southern  students  by  the  hundred  from 
Northern  schools  and  colleges.  What  sympathy  was 
expressed  for  John  Brown  served  to  bring  undeserved 
blame  upon  the  champions  against  slavery,  and  to 
exasperate  their  enemies.  The  elections  in  the  fall 
of  1859,  and  the  spring  of  1860,  showed  a  serious  check 
in  the  growth  of  the  party  by  which  slavery  was  to 
be  abolished. 

One  of  John  Brown's  many  mistakes  was  his  leaving 
for  capture  by  the  Virginians,  at  the  farm-house 
where  he  had  been  living,  a  carpet-bag  containing 
letters  implicating  his  Northern  friends,  and  among 
them  was  Douglass,  who  says  that,  "  When  that  bag 
was  opened,  there  we  were  all  sprawling."  He  had 
gone  to  Philadelphia  to  lecture  ;  and  he  hurried  by 
night  to  Hoboken, where  Miss  Assing  telegraphed  to  his 
son  to  secure  his  papers.  It  was  not  safe  for  him  to 
take  a  train  in  New  York  City,  but  he  was  driven  over 
to  Patterson,  a  station  on  the  Erie  Railroad  ;  and  thus 
he  was  able  to  return  to  Rochester  in  disguise. 
Scarcely  had  he  entered  his  house,  when  his  friends 
urged  him  to  go  to  Canada,  lest  there  should  be  a 
bloody  conflict  in  his  defense  against  the  officers  of 


276  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

the  law.  Buchanan's  marshals  are  said  to  have  been 
in  Rochester  within  six  hours  after  he  left  ;  and  Gov 
ernor  Wise  made  requisition  on  the  executive,  not 
only  of  New  York  but  also  of  Michigan,  where  he 
hoped  to  be  able  to  find  his  prey,  and  make  the  cap 
ture  by  means  of  agents  who  professed  to  be  traveling 
in  the  interest  of  the  Post-office  Department.  How 
thoroughly  in  earnest  he  was,  may  be  judged  from  a 
speech  which  he  made  in  Richmond,  on  December  21, 
at  a  reception  given  to  two  hundred  medical  students, 
who  had  just  left  the  school  at  Philadelphia.  The 
applause  was  tremendous  as  he  said  : 

"  Oh  if  I  had  had  one  good,  long,  low,  black,  rakish,  well- 
armed  steamer  in  Hampton  Roads,  I  would  have  placed  her 
on  the  Newfoundland  Banks,  with  orders,  if  she  found  a  British 
packet  with  that  negro  on  board,  to  take  him.  And  by  the 
eternal  gods  he  should  have  been  taken — taken  with  very  par 
ticular  instructions  not  to  hang  him  before  I  had  the  privilege 
of  seeing  him  well  hung." 

Such  was  the  danger  which  Douglass  escaped  by 
going  to  England.  He  took  the  steamer  at  Quebec, 
on  November  12  ;  and  the  place  which  he  was  to  have 
occupied  as  a  lecturer  in  the  Parker  Fraternity  Course 
in  Boston,  had  to  be  filled  by  Thoreau.  who  spoke 
enthusiastically  of  John  Brown. 

The  passage  across  the  ocean  occupied  fourteen 
stormy  days  ;  and  the  fugitive  feared  that  he  was 
going  into  life-long  exile.  John  Brown's  attack  on 
the  slave-power  showed  that  it  held  full  possession  of 
the  national  government,  as  it  seemed  likely  to  do  for 
years  to  comef  Public  opinion  was  so  much  against 
the  Abolitionists,  that  scarcely  any  one  could  see  how 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?  "  277 

brief  would  be  the  time,  before  they  would  have  full 
justice.  England  was  much  more  eager  than  Amer 
ica  to  hear  about  Harper's  Ferry  ;  and  our  lecturer 
found  himself  in  great  demand.  On  giving  an  account 
of  the  affair  at  Newcastle,  on  February  23,  1860,  he  de 
clared  that  "  Slavery  might  be  put  down  by  honestly 
carrying  out  the  provisions  of  the  Constitution." 
This  great  charter  was  then  assailed  as  pro-slavery 
by  George  Thompson,  in  Glasgow,  where  Douglass 
replied  on  March  26,  with  arguments  already  quoted. 
He  desired  at  this  time  to  visit  France  ;  but  the  Amer 
ican  minister,  Dallas,  who  had  been  Vice-President, 
refused  his  application  for  a  passport,  and  told  him 
that  he  was  not  a  citizen  of  the  United  States.  The 
French  minister  at  London  granted  a  permit  at  once. 
Before  the  visit  could  be  made  news  came  of  the 
death,  on  March  13,  "of  my  beloved  daughter,  Annie, 
the  light  and  life  of  my  house." 

The  bereaved  father  returned  at  once,  and  found 
that  he  was  in  no  particular  danger  at  the  North, 
where  there  had  been  a  great  change  in  public  opin 
ion  about  Harper's  Ferry.  The  John  Brown  song 
was  now  sung  in  all  the  free  States  ;  and  anti-slavery 
men  were  busy  organizing  the  campaign  in  which 
they  were  to  elect  their  President.  The  South  hated 
the  Abolitionists  as  bitterly  as  ever,  and  there  was  an 
armed  riot  at  Knoxville,  Tennessee,  against  a  colored 
man,  who  was  supposed  to  be  Frederick  Douglass. 
No  notice  of  his  return  was  taken,  however,  either  by 
Wise  or  Buchanan.  On  August  i,  1860,  he  spoke  at 
Geneva,  New  York,  as  he  had  done  the  year  before. 
The  Republicans  had  already  adopted  a  platform 
which  was  sufficiently  outspoken  about  the  refusal  to 


278  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

admit  Kansas,  the  slave-trade,  the  Dred  Scott  decision, 
and  the  other  attempts  to  carry  slavery  into  the  ter 
ritories.  John  Brown  was  censured,  as  we  have  seen  ; 
and  nothing  was  said  about  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill, 
or  the  abolition  of  slavery,  not  even  in  the  District  of 
Columbia.  Lincoln  owed  his  nomination  largely 
to  not  having  gone  so  far  in  opposition  to  slavery  as 
Seward  ;  and  the  spirit  of  the  convention  was  so  cau 
tious  as  to  cause  Giddings  to  retire  in  disgust. 
Douglass  pronounced  this  convention  even  more  un 
satisfactory  than  that  of  1856,  and  joined  with  others 
of  the  Radical  Political  Abolitionists  in  nominating 
Gerrit  Smith,  for  President.  The  little  band  soon 
received  an  important  ally.  Stephen  S.  Foster  had 
been  for  more  than  twenty  years  denouncing  all 
churches  and  parties  with  a  vigor  which  had  made 
him  suffer  more  persecutions  than  any  other  of  the 
Abolitionists.  His  influence  among  the  Garrisonians 
had  been  nearly  equal  to  that  of  the  leader  whose 
name  they  bore.  The  old  Berserker  now  made  his 
first  appearance  as  a  politician,  and,  I  think,  his  last 
one.  He  actually  started  a  movement  which  held  a 
convention  at  Worcester,  on  September  19  and  20,  in 
order  "  to  organize  a  political  party  upon  an  anti- 
slavery  interpretation  of  the  Constitution,  with  the 
avowed  purpose  of  abolishing  slavery  in  the  States  as 
well  as  the  territories."  Garrison  called  the  whole 
business  "  a  farce,"  and  Phillips  "  a  nuisance."  Lucy 
Stone  and  Higginson  spoke  at  Worcester,  but  in 
opposition  to  Foster  ;  and  his  only  supporter  of  much 
importance  was  Douglass,  who  succeeded  in  carrying 
a  resolution  endorsing  the  nomination  of  Gerrit 
Smith.  His  language  about  the  Garrisonians  seems 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?  279 

to  have  been  misunderstood  ;  and  he  gave  an  account 
of  his  speech  as  follows,  in  the  "  Liberator,"  for  Octo 
ber  26  : 

"  My  objection  to  the  American  Anti-Slavery  Society  respected 
its  plan,  not  its  life.  So  far  from  working  for  the  annihilation 
of  that  Society,  I  never  failed,  even  in  the  worst  times  of  my 
controversy  with  it,  to  recognize  that  organization  as  the  most 
efficient  generator  of  anti-slavery  sentiment  in  the  country." 
.  .  .  What  had  I  said  ?  Why ;  in  substance  this :  That 
the  plan  of  operation  adopted  by  the  American  Anti-Slavery 
Society  did  not  embrace  the  abolition  of  slavery  by  means  of 
the  government,  and  that  the  Radical  Abolition  party  was  the 
only  organization  which  proposed  such  abolition.  This  is  what 
I  said,  and  meant  to  say." 

At  the  very  time  he  wrote  this  letter,  he  received 
one  containing  a  proposition  which  I  copy  literally  : 

"  I  have  been  informed  that  you  had  an  onely  daughter,  and 
that  you  desire  her  to  marry  a  whight  man ;  whereupon  you 
giv  $15,000  or  $20,000  dollars  to  any  respectabl  whight  man 
that  would  marry  her  and  cherish  her  through  life.  If  there  is 
any  truth  in  this  report,  P.  S.  let  me  know  and  I  will  marry 
your  daughter  on  these  conditions,  and  will  endeavor  to  make 
myself  agreeable." 

Douglass,  in  reply,  remarks,  that  a  man  who  was  a 
total  stranger,  ought  to  have  given  at  least  one  refer 
ence,  and  then  says  : 

"  You  date  from  Auburn,  and  tell  me  to  direct  to  Auburn, 
but  do  not  name  the  street.  Pardon  me  for  regarding  this  as 
a  suspicious  circumstance.  You  may  be  an  inmate  of  the  State 
Prison,  or  on  your  way  there,  a  fact  which,  you  see,  would  in 
terfere  with  the  fulfillment  of  your  part  of  the  proposed  bargain, 
even  if  I  could  fulfill  the  part  you  assign  to  me.  You  want 
$15,000  or  $20,000.  This  is  a  common  want ;  and  you  are  not 


280  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

to  blame  for  using  all  honorable  means  to  obtain  it.  But  candor 
requires  me  to  state,  that  if  you  were  in  every  respect  a  suitable 
person  to  be  bought  for  the  purpose  you  name,  I  have  not  the 
money  to  buy  you.  I  have  no  objection  to  your  complexion  ; 
but  there  are  certain  little  faults  of  grammar  and  spelling  as  well 
as  other  little  points  in  your  letter,  which  compel  me  to  regard 
you  as  a  person,  by  education,  manners,  and  morals,  wholly  unfit 
to  associate  with  my  daughter  in  any  capacity  whatever.  You 
evidently  think  your  white  skin  of  great  value.  I  don't  dispute 
it  :  it  is  probably  the  best  thing  about  you.  Yet  not  even  that 
valuable  quality  can  commend  you  sufficiently  to  induce  even 
so  black  a  negro  as  myself  to  accept  you  as  his  son-in-law." 

I  presume  it  was  about  this  time  that  Mrs.  Doug 
lass  had  occasion  to  engage  a  servant,  and  said  to  her  : 
"  I  hope  you  have  no  prejudices  about  color.  I  have 
none  myself." 

Even  friendship  for  Gerrit  Smith  did  not  prevent 
Douglass  from  finally  deciding  to  do  what  he  could, 
in  his  "  Monthly "  and  on  the  platform,  to  elect 
Lincoln  ;  and  he  then  threw  himself  into  the  contest 
"with  firmer  faith  and  more  ardent  hope  than  ever 
before." 

The  triumph  of  the  Republicans  provoked  a  move 
ment  toward  secession  ;  and  conservative  people  in 
the  North  were  hoping  to  avert  the  danger  by  new 
compromises,  when  an  Abolitionist  meeting"  to  mark 
the  anniversary  of  the  Martyrdom  of  John  Brown," 
was  summoned  to  meet  on  December  3,  in  Tremont 
Temple,  Boston.  F.  B.  Sanborn  was  about  to  take 
the  chair,  when  some  well-dressed  men,  who  wished 
to  break  up  the  meeting,  insisted  on  having  their  own 
leader,  a  Mr.  Fay,  made  president.  This  man  pro 
ceeded  to  read  resolutions  denouncing  John  Brown, 
but  had  some  trouble,  either  with  his  voice  or  his 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?  "  281 

conscience,  whereupon  a  glass  of  water  was  handed 
him  by  Douglass,  who  said,  "  If  thine  enemy  thirst, 
give  him  drink."  He  was  to  have  been  the  orator  of 
the  day,  and  he  insisted  on  his  right  to  the  floor.  At 
length  he  got  a  chance  to  say,  amid  constant  inter 
ruption  : 

"  This  is  one  of  the  most  impudent,  barefaced  outrages  on 
free  speech  I  ever  witnessed  in  Boston  or  elsewhere.  I  can 
make  myself  heard.  I  know  your  masters.  I  have  served  the 
same  master  that  you  are  serving.  You  are  in  the  service  of 
the  slave-holders.  The  freedom  of  all  mankind  was  written 
upon  the  heart  by  the  finger  of  God.  It  is  said  that  the  best 
way  to  abolish  slavery  is  to  obey  the  law.  Shall  we  obey  the 
blood-hounds  of  the  law,  who  do  the  dirty  work  of  the  slave- 
catchers  ?  If  so  then  you  are  fit  for  your  work.  Mr.  Norris,  of 
New  Hampshire  asked  Wade,  of  Ohio,  in  the  Senate  of  the 
United  States,  if  he  would  render  his  personal  assistance  to  the 
execution  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill ;  and  that  noble-hearted 

man  and  Christian  gentleman  replied  '  I  will  see  you  d d 

first.'  Sir,  there  is  a  law  which  we  are  bound  to  obey,  and  the 
Abolitionists  are  most  prompt  to  obey  it.  It  is  that  law  written 
in  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  which  includes  all 
colors." 

Here  there  was  a  long  disturbance,  ending  with  a 
cry  of  "  Go  on,  nigger  !  "  "  If  I  were  a  slave-driver," 
said  Douglass,  "  and  had  hold  of  that  man  for  five 
minutes,  I  would  let  more  daylight  through  his  skin 
than  ever  got  there  before."  "  He  has  said  the  truth," 
interposed  Fay;  "  fora  negro  slave-drivei  is  the  most 
cruel  in  the  world."  "Yes,"  said  Douglass,  "just  as 
a  northern  dough-face  is  more  contemptible  than  a 
southern  slave-holder."  Here  the  meeting  was 
thoroughly  broken  up,  but  it  was  finally  reorganized 
with  another  friend  of  the  South,  named  Howe,  in  the 


282  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

chair.  Douglass  tried  repeatedly  to  speak,  but  was 
interrupted  by  cheer  after  cheer,  sometimes  for  the 
Union,  sometimes  for  himself,  and  sometimes  for  South 
Carolina.  He  called  himself  for  three  cheers  for 
liberty;  and  they  were  given  unanimously  ;  but  three 
more  followed  for  Governor  Wise,  who  had  threatened 
to  hang  him,  as  he  did  John  Brown.  At  last  his  at 
tempt  to  prevent  his  chair  from  being  taken  away  for 
Mr.  Howe  brought  about  so  much  confusion  that  the 
hall  was  cleared  by  the  police. 

The  next  Sunday  he  gave  his  lecture  on  "  Self- 
Made  Men  "  before  Theodore  Parker's  Society  in  the 
Music  Hall,  and  before  he  closed,  he  said  : 

"  The  mortifying  and  disgraceful  fact  stares  us  in  the  face, 
that  though  Faneuil  Hall  and  Bunker  Hill  Monument  stand,  free 
dom  of  speech  is  struck  down."  .  .  .  "Even  here  in  Boston, 
and  among  the  friends  of  freedom,  we  hear  two  voices,  one 
denouncing  the  mob  that  broke  up  our  meeting  on  Monday 
as  a  base  and  cowardly  outrage,  and  another  deprecating  and 
regretting  the  holding  of  such  a  meeting  by  such  men  at  such 
a  time.  We  are  told  that  the  meeting  was  ill-timed,  and  the 
parties  to  it  unwise.  Why,  what  is  the  matter  with  us  ?  Are 
we  going  to  palliate  and  excuse  a  palpable  and  flagrant  outrage 
on  the  right  of  speech,  by  implying  that  only  a  particular 
description  of  person  should  exercise  that  right  ?  Are  we  at 
such  a  time,  when  a  great  principle  has  been  struck  down,  to 
quench  the  moral  indignation  which  the  deed  excites  by  casting 
reflections  upon  those  on  whose  persons  the  outrage  has  been 
committed  ?  After  all  the  arguments  for  liberty  to  which  Boston 
has  listened  for  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century,  has  she  yet 
to  learn  that  the  time  to  assert  a  right  is  when  that  right  is 
called  in  question,  and  that  the  men  of  all  others  to  assert  it  are 
the  men  to  whom  the  right  has  been  denied  ?  " 

Similar  outrages  took  place  soon  after  at  the  Janu- 


"  IS    GOD    DEAD  ?  "  283 

ary  meeting  of  the  M.  A.  S.  S.,  and  at  other  anti-slav 
ery  conventions,  for  instance  at  Syracuse,  and  at 
Albany,  where  Douglass  was  in  serious  danger, 
and  the  Mayor  had  to  call  out  the  militia.  John 
Brown  had  given  the  North  two  songs,  one  saying 
that  his  soul  was  marching  on,  and  another,  which  I 
heard  sung  in  Boston  by  rioters,  who  would  not  let 
Emerson  speak,  and  which  spoke  thus  of  the  anti- 
slavery  governor  of  Massachusetts  : 

"  Tell  John  A.  Andrew,  John  Brown  's  dead !  " 


CHAPTER    XL 

UNION    FOREVER  ! 

STATE  after  State  was  now  seceding,  to  the  open 
delight,  not  only  of  Phillips  and  Garrison  but  of 
Beecher  and  James  Freeman  Clark.  Here,  as  well  as 
in  canonizing  John  Brown,  the  Abolitionists  naturally 
made  themselves  obnoxious  to  the  great  majority  of 
Northerners,  who  were  determined  that  the  Union 
should  be  preserved  and  the  laws  enforced.  The 
loyalty,  which  hissed  at  disunionism  in  the  North, 
soon  found  itself  much  better  employed  in  shooting 
at  it  in  the  South.  The  capture  of  Fort  Sumter 
brought  about  a  great  popular  uprising,  in  which  all 
differences  between  Republican  and  Democrat, 
Unionist  and  Abolitionist  disappeared.  The  North 
was  united  at  last  against  the  slave-holders  ;  and  the 
end  of  slavery  was  near. 

Douglass  had  tried,  in  the  April  number  of  his 
"  Monthly,"  to  convince  other  Abolitionists,  that  disso 
lution  of  the  Union  would  not  help  their  cause.  He 
was  preparing  to  sail  on  the  25th  of  that  month  to 
Hayti,  in  whose  condition  he  has  always  taken  great 
interest.  But  when  the  great  news  came,  he  gave  up 
the  trip.  His  May  number  came  out  with  the  figures 
of  the  American  eagle  and  the  star-spangled  banner, 
placed  at  the  head  of  the  first  column,  and  accom 
panied  by  the  motto,  "  Freedom  for  all,  or  Chains  for 
284 


UNION    FOREVER  !  285 

all."  Even  then  he  told  the  colored  men  to  form 
militia  companies  at  once,  and  make  ready  to  obey 
the  summons  to  enlist.  He  spoke  in  favor  of  the  war 
on  April  27,  in  Rochester,  and  often  afterward  in  vari 
ous  parts  of  the  North.  He  warned  his  hearers  from 
the  first,  that  the  contest  would  be  long  and  bloody. 
In  his  "Monthly"  for  October  he  says:  "Our  first 
business  is  to  save  our  Government  from  destruction." 
He  felt  satisfied  from  first  to  last,  that  the  mission  of 
the  war  was  not  only  the  salvation  of  the  Union,  but  the 
liberation  of  the  slave  ;  though  he  "  trusted  less  to 
the  virtue  of  the  North  than  to  the  villany  of  the 
South." 

He  was  not  repelled  either  by  the  outrages  upon 
fugitives  to  Union  camps,  or  by  occasional  insults  to 
himself.  When  he  was  announced  to  lecture  in  Syra 
cuse  on  Thursday,  November  14,  on  "  The  Rebellion, 
its  Cause  and  its  Remedy,"  placards  were  posted  up, 
headed,  "Nigger  Fred  Coming,"  and  evidently  meant 
to  stir  up  a  mob  against  "  This  reviler  of  the  Consti 
tution,"  "  Traitor  to  his  country,"  and  "  Arch-fugitive 
to  Europe."  The  Mayor  called  out  not  only  the 
entire  police  force,  but  also  seventy  special  officers 
and  forty-five  cadets  with  bayonets.  There  was  no 
disturbance  either  that  night  or  the  next,  when  Doug 
lass  delivered  a  lecture  which  was  repeated  that  win 
ter  in-  Boston,  in  the  Parker  Fraternity  Course,  and 
entitled  "  Life  Pictures." 

Early  in  the  year  1862  he  gave  a  lecture  in  the 
Music  Hall,  Boston,  in  a  course  arranged  by  the 
Emancipation  League,  recently  formed  to  agitate  for 
abolition  as  a  military  necessity.  Among  the  other 
speakers  were  Conway,Greeley,  Boutwell,  and  Phillips. 


286  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Douglass  was  also  employed  for  some  weeks  by  the 
League  as  a  lecturer  in  varions  parts  of  New  England. 
The  tenor  of  his  remarks  is  shown  in  an  address,  which 
was  given  on  January  14,  in  Philadelphia,  and  began 
thus  :  "  He  is  the  best  friend  of  his  country,  who  at 
this  tremendous  crisis  dares  to  tell  his  country-men 
the  truth,  however  disagreeable  that  truth  may  be."  He 
then  spoke  of  the  duty  of  the  North  to  arm  its  strong, 
black  hand,  as  well  as  its  soft,  white  one,  against 
the  rebels.  He  added  :  "  I  believed  ten  years  ago,  that 
liberty  was  safer  in  the  Union  than  out  of  the  Union  ; 
but  my  Garrisonian  friends  could  not  see  it,  and  in 
consequence  dealt  me  some  heavy  blows.  My  crime 
was  in  being  ten  years  in  advance  of  them."  He 
ended  by  saying  :  "  I  am  for  the  war,  for  the  Union, 
in  any  and  every  event." 

On  February  12,  he  made  this  protest  in  the  Cooper 
Institute,  against  the  talk  about  sending  his  people 
back  to  Africa : 

"  For  a  nation  to  drive  away  its  laboring  population  is  to 
commit  political  suicide."  ..."  It  is  affirmed  that  the 
negro,  if  emancipated,  could  not  take  care  of  himself.  My 
answer  to  this  is,  let  him  have  a  fair  chance  to  try  it.  For  two 
hundred  years  he  has  taken  care  of  himself  and  his  master  into 
the  bargain." 

"Douglass's  Monthly"  was  now  published  mainly 
for  American  readers,  at  the  price  of  $i  a  year,  but 
still  had  agents  in  Great  Britain.  The  reading  mat 
ter  was  almost  entirely  about  the  war  ;  but  the  last  of 
the  sixteen  pages  was  regularly  occupied  with  circu 
lars  designed  to  encourage  emigration  to  Hayti.  In 
the  number  for  May,  1862,  however,  the  editor  spoke 
with  regret  of  a  petition  of  colored  people  in  Wash- 


UNION  FOREVER!  287 

ington  for  aid  to  form  colonies  in  Central  America, 
and  declared  that  "  The  estimate  which  shall  be 
formed  of  the  negro,  and  the  place  which  he  shall 
hold  in  the  world's  esteem,  is  to  be  decided  here." 
.  .  .  "The  colored  race  never  can  be  respected 
anywhere,  till  they  are  respected  in  America."  "  The 
true  policy  of  the  colored  American  is  to  make  him 
self,  in  every  way  open  to  him,  an  American  citizen, 
bearing  with  proscription  and  insult  till  these  things 
disappear."  The  leading  topic  in  the  "Monthly" 
this  summer  was  the  duty  of  allowing  the  negro  to 
fight  in  his  own  cause  ;  much  is  said  about  what  had 
been  done  by  colored  soldiers  under  Jackson  and 
Washington  ;  and  the  progress  of  the  first  experiment 
in  South  Carolina  is  recounted  with  eager  interest. 

The  expectation  that  the  Union  would  be  restored 
by  a  single  battle  was  wofully  disappointed  ;  our 
progress  during  the  first  year  was  slight  ;  the  repulse 
of  our  best  army  before  Richmond,  in  June,  1862, 
showed  the  Confederacy  to  be  still  formidable  ;  and 
the  North  was  so  unwilling  to  free  the  slaves,  as  to 
give  rise  to  fears  that  peace  might  yet  be  made  at 
their  expense.  Such  was  the  state  of  things  when 
Douglass  gave  a  Fourth  of  July  oration  at  Himrod's 
Corners,  a  village  in  Western  New  York,  which  then 
consisted,  he  says,  of  "  two  taverns,  one  church,  six 
neat,  little  cottages,  one  store,  a  huge  pile  of  sawed 
wood  for  railroad  purposes,  and  a  celebration."  An 
audience  of  two  thousand  people  was  soon  collected 
in  a  pine  grove,  where  he  told  them  that  all  talk 
about  the  war's  having  any  other  cause  than  slavery 
was  like  "  the  Irishman's  gun,  aimed  at  nothing  and 
hitting  it  every  time."  He  then  complained  that  the 


288  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Administration  was  fighting  the  rebels  with  the  olive 
branch,  instead  of  the  sword,  and  that  McClellan,  who 
had  wasted  six  precious  months  needlessly,  and  then 
allowed  himself  to  be  defeated  by  inferior  forces, 
must  be  either  a  traitor  or  a  military  impostor.  Lin 
coln  he  blamed  for  not  adopting  a  decidedly  anti-slav 
ery  policy  ;  and  his  language  was  so  severe  as  to  call 
out  a  protest  from  one  of  his  hearers.  The  audience 
was  with  the  orator,  however  ;  and  he  had  the  pleas 
ure  of  finding  it  wholly  due  to  his  own  request,  that 
the  critic  was  patiently  heard,  and  not  handled 
roughly.  Among  the  concluding  passages  of  his  ora 
tion  are  these  : 

"  The  only  choice  left  to  this  nation  is  abolition  or  destruc 
tion.  You  must  abolish  slavery,  or  abandon  the  Union.  It  is 
plain  that  there  can  never  be  any  Union  between  the  North 
and  the  South,  while  the  South  values  slavery  more  than  nation 
ality.  A  union  of  interest  is  essential  to  a  union  of  ideas  ;  and 
without  this  union  of  ideas  the  outer  form  of  the  Union  will  be 
but  as  a  rope  of  sand."  ..."  There  is  plausibility  in  the 
argument  that  we  cannot  reach  slavery  until  we  have  sup 
pressed  the  rebellion.  Yet  it  is  far  more  true  to  say  that  we 
cannot  reach  the  rebellion,  until  we  have  suppressed  slavery. 
For  slavery  is  the  life  of  the  rebellion.  Let  the  loyal  army  but 
inscribe  upon  its  banner,  Emancipation  and  protection  to  all 
who  will  rally  under  it ;  and  no  power  could  prevent  a  stam 
pede  from  slavery,  such  as  the  world  has  not  witnessed  since 
the  Hebrews  crossed  the  Red  Sea.  I  am  convinced  that  this 
rebellion  and  slavery  are  twin  monsters  ;  that  they  must  fall  or 
flourish  together,  and  that  all  attempts  at  upholding  one,  while 
putting  down  the  other,  will  be  followed  by  continued  trains  of 
darkening  calamities,  such  as  make  this  anniversary  of  our 
national  independence  a  day  of  mourning  instead  of  a  day  of 
transcendent  joy  and  gladness."  ..."  I  have  told  you  of 


UNION    FOREVER  !  289 

great  national  opportunities  in  the  past,  a  greater  than  any  in 
the  past  is  the  opportunity  of  the  present.  If  now  we  omit  the 
duty  it  imposes,  steel  our  hearts  against  its  teachings,  or  shrink 
in  cowardice  from  the  work  of  to-day,  your  fathers  will  have 
fought  and  bled  in  vain  to  establish  free  institutions,  and  Amer 
ican  republicanism  will  become  a  hissing  and  a  by-word  to  a 
mocking  earth." 

On  the  following  Monday  he  took  part  in  a  cele 
bration,  held  by  colored  people,  at  Ithaca,  in  memory 
of  the  recent  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of 
Columbia.  The  day  selected,  July  8,  1862,  was  that 
on  which  New  York  decreed  emancipation,  sixty-three 
years  before.  The  whole  surrounding  country,  within 
a  radius  of  a  hundred  miles,  was  nobly  represented  ; 
the  procession,  with  bands  of  both  colors,  won  the  ad 
miration  of  all  beholders ;  and  the  orator  of  the  day 
was  delighted  with  the  change  "  since  our  first  anti- 
slavery  meeting  there  twenty  years  ago,  when  violence 
met  us  at  every  turn." 

The  preliminary  declarations  of  the  Administration, 
that  the  war  was  not  against  slavery,  had  been  too 
literally  taken  in  Great  Britain  ;  her  Abolitionists 
now  out-garrisoned  Garrison,  and  still  thought  our 
Union  and  slavery  so  closely  incorporated,  that  they 
must  survive  or  perish,  be  restored  or  abolished,  to 
gether  ;  and  her  manufacturers  could  ill  afford  to 
be  without  American  cotton.  Her  government  had 
been  too  friendly  to  the  rebels,  especially  in  letting 
loose  the  Alabama  ;  and  their  recent  victories  made 
their  recognition  seem  near  at  hand.  To  avert  it, 
Beecher  crossed  the  ocean  in  1863.  Douglass  sent  his 
protest  in  1862.  Immediately  after  Lincoln's  first 
proclamation  of  emancipation  on  September  22,  ap- 


290  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

peared  "  The  Slave's  Appeal  to  Great  Britain,  by  Fred 
erick  Douglass."  The  most  important  paragraphs 
of  the  little  pamphlet  are  as  follows  : 

"  Hear,  I  beseech  you,  my  humble  appeal,  and  grant  this, 
my  earnest  request.  I  know  your  power,  I  know  your  justice, 
and,  better  still,  I  know  your  mercy ;  and  with  the  more  confi 
dence  I,  in  my  imperfect  speech,  venture  to  appeal  to  you. 
Your  benevolent  sons  and  daughters,  at  great  sacrifice  of  time, 
labor,  and  treasure,  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago, 
under  the  inspiration  of  an  enlightened  Christianity,  removed 
the  yoke  of  cruel  bondage  from  the  long  bowed-down  necks  of 
eight-hundred  thousand  of  my  race  in  your  West  India  Islands  ; 
and  later  a  few  of  them,  in  their  generosity,  unasked,  with 
silver  and  gold  ransomed  me  from  him  who  claimed  me  as  his 
slave  in  the  United  States,  and  bade  me  speak  in  the  cause  of 
the  dumb  millions  of  my  countrymen  still  in  slavery.  I  am  now 
fulfilling  my  appointed  mission  by  making,  on  the  slave's  behalf, 
this  appeal  to  you.  I  am  grateful  for  your  benevolence,  zealous 
for  your  honor,  but  chiefly  now  I  am  concerned  lest,  in  the 
present  tremendous  crisis  of  American  affairs,  you  should  be 
led  to  adopt  a  policy  which  would  defeat  the  now  proposed 
emancipation  of  my  people,  and  forge  new  fetters  of  slavery 
for  unborn  generations  of  their  posterity. 

"  You  are  now  more  than  ever  urged,  both  from  within  and 
from  without  your  borders,  to  recognize  the  independence  of 
the  so-called  Confederate  States  of  America.  I  beseech  and 
implore  you,  resist  this  urgency.  You  have  nobly  resisted  it 
thus  long.  You  can,  and  I  ardently  hope  you  will,  resist  it 
still  longer.  The  proclamation  of  emancipation  by  President 
Lincoln  will  become  operative  on  the  first  of  January,  1863. 
The  hopes  of  millions,  long  meted  out  and  trodden  down, 
now  rise  with  every  advancing  hour.  Oh  !  I  pray  you,  by  all 
your  highest  and  holiest  memories,  blast  not  the  budding  hopes 
of  these  millions  by  lending  your  countenance  and  extending 
your  honored  and  potent  hand  to  the  blood-stained  fingers  of 
the  impious  slave-holding  Confederate  States  of  America.  .  .  . 


UNION    FOREVER  !  291 

"  I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  if  you,  Great  Britain,  had, 
at  the  outset  of  this  terrible  war,  sternly  frowned  upon  the  con 
spirators,  and  given  your  earnest  and  unanimous  sympathy  and 
moral  support  to  the  loyal  cause,  to-day  might  have  seen 
America  enjoying  security  and  peace,  and  you  would  not  have 
been  the  sufferer  that,  in  all  your  commercial  and  manufactur 
ing  interests,  you  now  are.  .  .  . 

"  Wanting  a  slave-holding  constitution,  the  Southern  States 
have  undertaken  to  make  one,  and  establish  it  upon  the  ruins 
of  the  one  under  which  slavery  can  be  discouraged,  crippled, 
and  abolished.  The  war,  therefore,  for  maintaining  the  old 
against  the  new  constitution,  even  though  no  proclamation  of 
emancipation  had  been  issued  by  the  loyal  government,  under 
the  old  constitution,  is  essentially  an  anti-slavery  war,  and 
should  command  the  ardent  support  of  good  men  in  all  countries. 
What  though  our  timid  administration  at  Washington,  shrink 
ing  from  the  logical  result  of  their  own  natural  position,  did, 
at  the  first,  refuse  to  recognize  the  real  character  of  the  war, 
and  vainly  attempted  to  conciliate,  by  walking  backward  to 
cast  a  mantle  over  the  revolting  origin  of  the  rebellion  ?  What 
though  they  instructed  their  foreign  agent  to  conceal  the  moral 
deformity  of  the  rebels  ?  You  could  not  fail  to  know  that  the 
primal  causes  of  this  war  rested  in  slavery  and  a  determination 
on  the  part  of  the  rebels  to  make  that  stupendous  crime  and 
curse  all  controlling  and  perpetual  in  America.  But  I  will  not 
wear)-  you  with  argument.  The  case  is  plain.  The  North  is 
fighting  on  the  side  of  liberty  and  civilization,  and  the  South  for 
slavery  and  barbarism.  .  .  . 

"  No  excuses,  however  plausible  ;  no  distances  of  time,  how 
ever  remote ;  no  line  of  conduct,  however  excellent,  will  erase 
the  deep  stain  upon  your  honor  and  truth,  if,  at  this  hour  of 
dreadful  trial,  you  interpose  in  a  manner  to  defeat  the  emanci 
pation  of  the  American  slaves.  If  at  any  time  you  could  have 
intervened  honorably  in  American  affairs,  it  was  when  the 
Federal  government  was  vainly  endeavoring  to  put  down  the 
rebellion  without  hurting  slavery.  That  gloomy  period  ended  on 
the  22d  of  September,  1862.  From  that  day  our  war  has  been 


292  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

invested  with  a  sanctity  which  will  smite  as  with  death  even 
the  mailed  hand  of  Britain,  if  outstretched  t,o  arrest  it.  Let  this 
conflict  go  on  ;  there  is  no  doubt  of  the  final  result ;  and  though 
it  is  a  dreadful  scourge,  it  will  make  justice,  humanity,  and 
liberty  permanently  possible  in  this  country." 

To  his  own  fellow-citizens  he  wrote,  about  this 
time,  as  follows  : 

"  What  shall  be  done  with  the  four  million  slaves,  if  they  are 
emancipated  ?  This  question  has  been  answered,  and  can  be 
answered  in  many  ways.  Primarily,  it  is  a  question  less  for 
man  than  for  God, — less  foi  human  intellect  than  for  the  laws 
of  nature  to  solve.  It  assumes  that  nature  has  erred  ;  that  the 
law  of  liberty  is  a  mistake ;  that  freedom,  though  a  natural 
want  of  the  human  soul,  can  only  be  enjoyed  at  the  expense  of 
human  welfare,  and  that  men  are  better  off  in  slavery  than  they 
would  be  in  freedom  ;  that  slavery  is  the  natural  order  of  human 
relations,  and  that  liberty  is  an  experiment. — What  shall  be 
done  with  them  ? 

"  Our  answer  is,  Do  nothing  with  them  ;  mind  your  business 
and  let  them  mind  theirs.  Your  doing  with  them  is  the  great 
est  misfortune.  They  have  been  undone  by  your  doings  ;  and 
all  they  now  ask,  and  really  have  need  of  at  your  hands,  is  just 
to  let  them  alone.  They  suffer  by  every  interference,  and  suc 
ceed  best  by  being  let  alone.  The  negroes  should  have  been  let 
alone  in  Africa,  let  alone  when  the  pirates  and  robbers  offered 
them  for  sale  in  our  Christian  slave-markets,  (more  cruel  and 
inhuman  than  the  Mohammedan  slave-markets,)  let  alone  by 
courts,  judges,  politicians,  legislators,  and  slave-drivers,  let 
alone  altogether,  and  assured  that  they  were  thus  to  be  let 
alone  forever,  and  that  they  must  now  make  their  own  way  in 
the  world,  just  the  same  as  any  and  every  other  variety  of  the 
human  family.  As  colored  men  we  only  ask  to  be  allowed  to 
do  with  ourselves,  subject  only  to  the  same  great  laws  for  the 
welfare  of  human  society  which  apply  to  other  men,  Jews,  gen 
tiles,  barbarian,  Scythian.  Let  us  stand  upon  our  own  legs, 


UNION    FOREVER  !  293 

work  with  our  own  hands,  and  eat  bread  in  the  sweat  of  our 
own  brows.  When  you,  our  white  countrymen,  have  attempted 
to  do  anything  for  us,  it  has  generally  been  to  deprive  us  of  some 
right,  power,  or  privilege,  which  you  yourselves  would  die 
before  you  would  submit  to  have  taken  from  you.  When  the 
planters  of  the  WTest  Indies  used  to  attempt  to  puzzle  the  pure- 
minded  Wilberforce  with  the  question,  '  How  shall  we  get  rid 
of  slavery  ?  '  his  simple  answer  was,  '  Quit  stealing.'  In  like 
manner  we  answer  those  who  are  perpetually  puzzling  their 
brains  with  questions  as  to  what  shall  be  done  with  the  negro, 
'  Let  him  alone,  and  mind  your  own  business.'  If  you  see  him 
ploughing  in  the  open  field,  leveling  the  forest,  at  work  with  '  a 
spade,  a  rake,  a  hoe,  a  pickaxe,  or  a  bill,'  let  him  alone  :  he  has 
a  right  to  work.  If  you  see  him  on  his  way  to  school,  with 
spelling-book,  geography,  and  arithmetic  in  his  hands,  let  him 
alone.  Don't  shut  the  door  in  his  face,  or  bolt  your  gates 
against  him  ;  he  has  a  right  to  learn  ;  let  him  alone.  Don't  pass 
laws  to  degrade  him.  If  he  has  a  ballot  in  his  hand,  and  is  on 
his  way  to  the  ballot-box  to  deposit  his  vote  for  the  man  who, 
he  thinks,  will  most  justly  and  wisely  administer  the  govern 
ment  which  has  the  power  of  life  and  death  over  him,  as  well 
as  others,  let  him  alone ;  his  right  of  choice  deserves  as 
much  respect  and  protection  as  your  own.  If  you  see  him  on 
his  way  to  church,  exercising  religious  liberty  in  accordance 
with  this  or  that  religious  persuasion,  let  him  alone.  Don't 
meddle  with  him,  nor  trouble  yourselves  with  any  questions  as 
to  what  shall  be  done  with  him. 

"  What  shall  be  done  with  the  negro,  if  emancipated  ?  Deal 
justly  with  him.  He  is  a  human  being  capable  of  judging  be 
tween  good  and  evil,  right  and  wrong,  liberty  and  slavery,  and 
is  as  much  a  subject  of  law  as  any  other  man  ;  therefore  deal 
justly  with  him.  He  is,  like  other  men,  sensible  of  the  motives 
of  reward  and  punishment.  Give  him  wages  for  his  work,  and 
let  hunger  pinch  him  if  he  don't  work.  He  knows  the  differ 
ence  between  fullness  and  famine,  plenty  and  scarcity.  '  But 
will  he  work  ?  '  Why  should  he  not  ?  He  is  used  to  it,  and  is 
not  afraid  of  it.  His  hands  are  already  hardened  by  toil ;  and 


294  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

he  has  no  dreams  of  ever  getting  a  living  by  any  other  means 
than  by  hard  work.  '  But  would  you  turn  them  all  loose  ? ' 
Certainly.  We  are  no  better  than  our  Creator.  He  has  turned 
them  loose,  and  why  should  not  we  ?  '  But  would  you  let 
them  all  stay  here  ?  '  Why  not  ?  What  better  is  here  than 
there  ?  Will  they  occupy  more  room  as  freeman  than  as  slaves  ? 
Is  the  presence  of  a  black  freeman  less  agreeable  than  that  of  a 
black  slave  ?  Is  the  object  of  your  injustice  and  cruelty  a  more 
ungrateful  sight  than  one  of  your  justice  and  benevolence  ? 
You  have  borne  the  one  more  than  two  hundred  years.  Can't 
you  bear  the  other  long  enough  to  try  the  experiment  ? " 
("The  Black  Man,  His  Antecedents,  His  Genius,  and  His 
Achievements,  by  William  Wells  Brown,  1863,"  pp.  184-7.) 

When  the  first  of  January  dawned,  it  seemed  still 
doubtful  whether  emancipation  would  really  be  pro 
claimed,  as  promised.  The  Tremont  Temple,  in  Bos 
ton,  was  occupied  all  day  by  Abolitionists,  who  wTaited, 
hour  after  hour,  hoping  that  the  news  would  come. 
Among  the  speakers  in  the  afternoon  was  Frederick 
Douglass,  who  declared  that  if  free  discussion  of 
slavery  had  been  allowed  thirty  years  before,  it  would 
long  ago  have  been  abolished  as  peaceably  as  in  the 
West  Indies.  He  thanked  God  that  he  had  lived  to 
see  the  beginning  of  the  end  of  the  abomination. 
Emancipation  might  not  seem  a  success  at  first  ;  but 
he  was  sure  it  would  be  so  in  the  end.  Laughter  and 
applause  accompanied  his  declarations  of  the  capacity 
of  his  race.  When  the  people  met  again  in  the  even 
ing,  they  were  very  anxious  ;  for  nothing  had  been 
heard  of  the  proclamation.  Would  it  come  ?  Why 
was  it  delayed  ?  He  did  his  best  to  cheer  the  audi 
ence  ;  and  so  did  Miss  Anna  E.  Dickinson,  then  at  the 
beginning  of  her  great  career.  There  was  only  one 
voice  that  any  one  really  wished  to  hear  ;  and  that 


UNION    FOREVER  !  295 

was  silent.  Hour  after  hour  came  and  went  ;  and  the 
shadows  grew  deeper  and  deeper  around  every  heart. 
At  last,  a  man  hurried  in,  his  face  glorious  with  tri 
umph,  shouting  :  "  It  is  coming  !  It  is  on  the  wires  !  " 

All  the  audience  were  shouting  or  weeping  for  joy. 
Soon  the  proclamation  was  read  aloud  from  the  plat 
form  ;  and  then  Douglass  led  in  singing  a  hymn  with 
the  chorus,  "  This  is  the  year  of  jubilee  !  "  The  peo 
ple  were  unwilling  to  leave  the  hall  at  midnight,  when 
it  was  to  be  vacated  according  to  agreement  ;  so  they 
adjourned  to  the  church  belonging  to  the  colored 
Baptists.  There  they  stayed,  and  he  among  them, 
until  day  broke.  Their  day  of  independence  had 
dawned  at  last. 

His  position,  during  the  past  ten  years,  that  slavery 
was  not  to  be  abolished  by  denouncing  but  by  enforc 
ing  the  Constitution,  was  fully  justified  by  the  word 
ing  of  both  proclamations.  The  September  one 
declared  that  the  war  had  been  and  would  be  "  prose 
cuted  for  the  object  of  practically  restoring"  the 
Union  ;  and  in  January,  emancipation  was  announced 
"as  a  fit  and  necessary  war  measure  for  suppressing 
said  rebellion,"  and  as  "  an  act  of  justice,  warranted  by 
the  Constitution  upon  military  necessity."  Lincoln's 
paramount  object  was  still  "  to  save  the  Union,  and 
not  either  to  save  or  destroy  slavery  ;"  but  in  order  to 
keep  the  Union  alive  he  had  to  strike  slavery  dead. 
Mr.  Douglass  has  recently  been  told  "  that  he  was 
wrong  and  Mr.  Garrison  right ;  that  the  dissolution 
of  the  Union  was  the  only  way  to  free  his  race."  His 
answer  is  :  "  Had  the  Union  been  dissolved,  the  col 
ored  people  of  the  South  would  now  be  in  the  hateful 
chains  of  slavery.  No,  no,  it  was  not  the  destruction 


296  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

but  the  salvation  of  the  Union  that  saved  the  slave." 
It  was  that  very  determination  to  keep  up  the  Union, 
whatever  else  might  go  down,  which  Garrison  and 
Phillips  had  for  so  many  years  been  trying  to  get  out 
of  their  way.  The  stone  which  they  rejected  became 
the  head  of  the  corner.  Whosoever  fell  upon  it  was 
broken  ;  and  it  ground  slavery  to  powder. 

McClellan's  disasters  were  largely  due  to  his  refus 
ing  to  shelter  fugitive  slaves,  or  even  to  pay  proper 
attention  to  their  reports.  Similar  unwillingness  to 
take  any  steps  toward  emancipation,  made  the  North 
long  delay  to  follow  the  example  promptly  set  by  the 
South  in  enlisting  colored  soldiers.  Nothing  shows 
more  clearly  the  unreasonableness  of  the  color-prej 
udice  than  its  standing  in  the  way  of  calling  upon 
the  free  negroes  in  loyal  States  to  help  crush  the  re 
bellion.  No  one  who  knew  anything  about  the  Revolu 
tionary  War,  or  that  of  1812,  to  say  nothing  of  the  Ma 
roons  in  Jamaica,  could  deny  the  ability  of  negroes  to 
fight  ;  they  were  much  better  fitted  to  withstand  the 
Southern  climate,  than  any  other  men  who  could  be  en 
listed  ;  and  the  need  of  more  troops  soon  became  so 
urgent  that  those  Northerners  who  were  not  Abolition 
ists  might  reasonably  have  been  expected  to  say,  as 
"  Punch  "  thinks  they  did:  "  It's  better  using  niggers 
up  than  citizens  like  us." 

Conscription  of  whites  had  actually  been  resorted 
to  by  Ohio,  and  was  about  to  be  imposed  upon  all 
delinquent  States  by  Congress,  when,  in  January,  1863, 
a  permission  to  raise  colored  regiments  was  given  to 
Massachusetts,  which  had  offered  them  in  vain  five 
months  before.  Too  many  fugitives  had  been  returned 
by  our  army  to  make  their  brethren  eager  to  enlist. 


UNION    FOREVER  !  297 

Only  a  hundred  recruits  were  obtained  during  the 
first  six  weeks ;  and  Governor  Andrew  said  to  Mr. 
Stearns,  "  I  am  afraid  we  shall  have  to  give  up  our 
colored  regiments."  "  I  will  raise  one  for  you,"  was 
the  reply,  "  if  you  will  authorize  it."  "  And  when  will 
you  set  about  it  ? "  "  To-morrow  morning  !  "  It  was 
ten  degrees  below  zero,  when  Mr.  Stearns  started 
before  day-break,  and  went  straight  to  Rochester. 
The  first  man  whom  he  enlisted  was  Charles  Douglass, 
and  the  latter's  father  promptly  published  in  his 
"  Monthly  "  an  address,  which  is  dated  March  2,  and 
runs  thus : 

"  Men  of  Color  to  Arms"  ...  "  Action !  Action !  not 
criticism,  is  the  plain  duty  of  this  hour.  Words  are  now 
useful,  only  as  they  stimulate  to  blows."  ...  "  There  is  no 
time  to  delay.  The  tide  is  at  its  flood  that  leads  on  to  for 
tune.  From  East  to  West,  from  North  to  South,  the  sky  is 
.written  all  over,  '  Now  or  Never.'  Liberty  won  by  white  men 
would  lose  half  its  lustre.'  Who  would  be  free, themselves  must 
strike  the  blow.'  '  Better  even  die  free  than  live  slaves.'  This  is 
the  sentiment  of  every  brave  colored  man  amongst  us."  .  .  . 
"  I  have  not  thought  lightly  of  the  words  I  am  now  addressing 
you.  The  counsel  I  give  comes  of  close  observation  of  the 
great  struggle  now  in  progress,  and  of  the  deep  conviction  that 
this  is  your  hour  and  mine.  In  good  earnest  then,  and  after  the 
best  deliberation,  I  now,  for  the  first  time  during  this  war,  feel 
at  liberty  to  call  and  counsel  you  to  arms.  By  every  considera 
tion  which  binds  you  to  your  enslaved  fellow-countrymen,"  .  .  . 
"  by  every  aspiration  which  you  cherish  for  the  freedom  and 
equality  of  yourselves  and  your  children,  by  all  the  ties  of  blood 
and  identity  which  make  us  one  with  the  brave  black  men  now 
fighting  our  battles  in  Louisiana  and  South  Carolina,  I  urge 
you  to  fly  to  arms,  and  smite  with  death  the  power  which  would 
bury  the  government  and  your  liberty  in  the  same  hopeless 
grave."  ,  ,  .  "  We  can  get  at  the  throat  of  treason  and 


298  FREDERICK.  DOUGLASS. 

slavery  through  the  State  of  Massachusetts.  She  was  first 
in  the  War  of  Independence,"  .  .  .  "first  to  make  the  black 
man  equal  before  the  law,  first  to  admit  colored  children  to 
her  common  schools;  and  she  was  first  to  answer  with  her 
blood  the  alarm-cry  of  the  nation,  when  its  capital  was  menaced 
by  rebels.  You  know  her  patriotic  Governor ;  and  you  know 
Charles  Sumner.  I  need  not  add  more. 

"  Massachusetts  now  welcomes  you  to  arms  as  soldiers.  She 
has  but  a  small  colored  population  from  which  to  recruit."  .  .  . 
"  Go  quickly,  and  help  fill  up  the  first  colored  regiment  from  the 
North.".  .  .  "  I  will  not  argue.  To  do  so  implies  hesitation  and 
doubt ;  and  you  do  not  hesitate  :  you  do  not  doubt.  The  day 
dawns  :  the  morning-star  is  bright  upon  the  horizon.  The  iron 
gate  of  our  prison  stands  half  open,  one  gallant  rush  from  the 
North  will  fling  it  wide  open,  while  four  millions  of  our  brothers 
and  sisters  shall  march  out  into  liberty.  The  chance  is  now  given 
you  to  end  in  a  day  the  bondage  of  centuries,  and  to  rise  in  one 
bound  from  social  degradation  to  the  plain  of  common  equality 
with  all  other  varieties  of  men.  Remember  Denmark  Vesey, 
of  Charleston :  remember  Nathaniel  Turner,  of  Southampton  : 
remember  Shields  Green  and  Copeland,  who  followed  noble 
John  Bro\vn  and  fell  as  martyrs  for  the  cause  of  the  slave. 
Remember  that  in  a  contest  with  oppression,  the  Almighty  has 
no  attribute  which  can  take  sides  with  oppressors.  The  case 
is  before  you.  This  is  our  golden  opportunity.  Let  us  accept 
it,  and  forever  wipe  out  the  dark  reproaches  unsparingly 
hurled  against  us  by  our  enemies.  Let  us  win  for  ourselves 
the  gratitude  of  our  country,  and  the  best  blessing  of  our  pos 
terity  through  all  time." 

It  was  largely  due  to  this  appeal,  and  those  made 
by  its  author  to  individuals,  that  Massachusetts  was 
able  to  send  out  the  regiment  which  Colonel  Shaw 
led  to  plant  our  flag  upon  Fort  Wagner,  first  in  the 
attack.  Among  the  foremost  who  mounted  upon  the 
rampart  was  Sergeant-Major  Lewis  H.  Douglass, 


UNION    FOREVER  !  299 

shouting,  "  Come  on  boys,  and  fight  for  God  and 
Governor  Andrew  !  "  His  sword  was  shot  from  his 
side  ;  but  both  he  and  his  brother  Charles  have  sur 
vived  the  contest. 

Their  father  was  on  the  wrharf  when  they  left  Boston ; 
and  he  did  his  best  to  help  them  and  their  comrades 
depart  in  a  spirit  worthy  of  the  cause.  As  he  spoke 
in  public,  a  day  or  two  before,  he  actually  chuckled 
with  delight  at  the  thought  that  men  of  his  color, 
and  even  of  his  own  blood,  were  at  last  going  to 
stand  equal  with  the  whites  on  the  field  of  honor.  It 
was  anniversary  week  ;  and  he  had  been  regularly 
invited  in  company  with  Senator  Wilson,  to  address 
the  Emancipation  League  at  a  meeting  where  he  was 
chief  speaker.  On  the  evening  after  the  regiment 
had  departed,  Thursday,  May  28,  he  came  without 
special  invitation  to  the  annual  convention  of  the 
Garrisonians,  where  he  was  recognized  by  the  audi 
ence,  who  called  him  out.  He  said  he  felt  inexpres 
sible  pleasure  in  taking  his  place  once  more  on  the 
freest  platform  in  the  world,  and  added  : 

"Emancipation  is  coming;  and  another  question  appears. 
What  shall  be  done  with  the  slaves  ?  Where  shall  we,  the 
colored  people,  stand  ?  Shall  we  be  wholly  free,  and  equal  at 
the  ballot-box,  at  the  jury-box,  and  at  the  cartridge-box  ?  The 
negro  may  at  first  be  better  able  to  do  justice  to  himself  under 
white  officers  ;  but  there  are  men  in  the  Fifty-fourth  capable  of 
command ;  and  promotion  should  be  opened  to  them.  " 

Some  of  the  other  members  of  the  convention 
thought  he  ought  to  have  insisted  on  having  colored 
officers  from  the  start.  His  own  view  was  the  wiser 
one,  as  may  be  seen  from  a  more  deliberate  state 
ment. 


300  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

On  June  17,  1863,  the  citizens  of  Philadelphia 
obtained  leave  to  raise  colored  regiments  under  the 
supervision  of  Major  Stearns  ;  and  a  mass  meeting 
was  held  in  that  city  on  July  6,  when  urgent  calls 
for  volunteers  were  made  by  Judge  Kelley  and  Miss 
Anna  E.  Dickinson.  Then  Douglass  came  forward 
to  meet  the  objection  made  by  his  people,  that  they 
ought  first  to  be  put  on  terms  of  equality  with  the 
whites,  as  regarded  pay,  bounty,  rations,  and  right  to 
choose  officers  out  of  the  ranks. 

"  There  is  "  [said  he,]  "  something  deep  down  in  the  soul  of 
every  man  present,  which  assents  to  the  justice  of  the  claim 
thus  made,  and  honors  the  manhood  and  self-respect  which 
insists  upon  it.  I  say  at  once,  in  peace  and  in  war,  I  am  con 
tent  with  nothing  for  the  black  man  short  of  equal  and  exact 
justice.  The  only  question  I  have,  and  the  point  on  which  I 
differ  from  those  who  refuse  to  enlist,  is  whether  the  colored 
man  is  more  likely  to  obtain  justice  and  equality,  while  refusing 
to  assist  in  putting  down  this  tremendous  rebellion,  than  he 
would  be  if  he  should  promptly,  generously,  and  earnestly  give 
his  hand  and  heart  to  the  salvation  of  the  country  in  this  its 
day  of  calamity  and  peril.  Nothing  can  be  more  plain,  nothing 
more  certain,  than  that  the  speediest  and  best  possible  way 
open  to  us  to  manhood,  is  that  we  enter  this  service.  For 
my  own  part,  I  hold  that  if  the  Government  of  the  United 
States  offered  nothing  more  as  an  inducement  to  colored  men 
to  enlist  than  bare  subsistence  and  arms,  considering  the  moral 
effects  of  compliance  upon  ourselves,  it  would  be  the  wisest  and 
best  thing  for  us  to  enlist." 

He  then  compared  the  attitude  of  the  Jefferson 
Davis  administration  toward  the  negro  with  that 
then  taken  by  the  Government  with  which  his  hear 
ers  were  "  called  upon  to  co-operate  in  burying  rebel 
lion  and  slavery  in  a  common  ground." 


UNION    FOREVER  !  30! 

"  Never  since  the  world  began  was  there  a  better  chance 
offered  to  a  long  enslaved  and  oppressed  people.  The  oppor 
tunity  is  given  us  to  be  men.  With  one  courageous  resolution, 
we  may  blot  out  the  handwriting  of  ages  against  us.  Once  let 
the  black  man  get  upon  his  person  the  brass  letters  U.  S.,  let 
him  get  an  eagle  on  his  button,  and  a  musket  on  his  shoulder, 
and  bullets  in  his  pocket ;  and  there  is  no  power  on  the  earth, 
or  under  the  earth,  which  can  deny  that  he  has  earned  the  right 
of  citizenship  in  the  United  States."  ..."  Do  not  flatter  your 
selves,  my  friends,  that  you  are  more  important  to  the  Govern 
ment  than  the  Government  is  to  you.  You  stand  but  as  the 
plank  to  the  ship.  This  rebellion  can  be  put  down  without 
your  help.  Slavery  can  be  abolished  by  white  men  ;  but  liberty 
so  won  for  the  black  man,  while  it  may  leave  him  an  object  of 
pity,  can  never  make  him  an  object  of  respect.  Depend  upon 
it,  this  is  no  time  for  hesitation.  Do  you  say  you  want  the 
same  pay  that  white  men  get  ?  I  believe  that  the  justice  and 
magnanimity  of  your  country  will  speedily  grant  it.  But  will 
you  be  over-nice  about  this  matter?  Do  you  get  as  good 
wages  now  as  white  men  get,  by  staying  out  of  the  service  ? 
Don't  you  work  for  less  every  day  than  white  men  get  ?  You 
know  you  do.  But  I  hear  you  say  you  want  black  officers  ? 
Very  well ;  and  I  have  not  the  slightest  doubt,  that  in  the  prog 
ress  of  this  war  we  shall  see  black  officers,  black  colonels,  and 
generals  even.  But  is  it  not  ridiculous  of  us,  in  all  at  once 
refusing  to  be  commanded  by  white  men  in  time  of  war,  when 
we  are  everywhere  commanded  by  wrhite  men  in  time  of  peace  ?  " 

Within  a  week  after  speaking  thus,  he  was  obliged, 
on  his  return  home,  to  pass  through  the  city  of  New 
York,  while  a  mob  of  rioters  against  the  conscription 
were  murdering  little  children  because  they  belonged 
to  his  race.  On  the  first  of  August  he  wrote  and  pub 
lished  a  letter  to  Major  Stearns,  which  may  be  found 
in  the  "Life  and  Times"  (pp.  382-4).  Here  he 
states  that  he  had  been  obliged  to  decline  an  invita- 


302  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

tion  to  speak  at  a  meeting  for  promoting  enlistments 
at  Pittsburgh  : 

"  I  must  for  the  present  leave  to  others  the  work  of  persuad 
ing  colored  men  to  join  the  Union  army.  I  owe  it  to  my  long- 
abused  people,  and  especially  to  those  already  in  the  army,  to 
expose  their  wrongs  and  plead  their  cause.  I  cannot  do  that 
in  connection  with  recruiting.  When  I  plead  for  recruits,  I 
want  tt)  do  it  with  all  my  heart,  without  qualification.  I  cannot 
do  that  now." 

The  original  plan  of  using  colored  troops  to  garri 
son  forts  in  unhealthy  places,  had  not  been  followed. 
They  had  been  exposed  in  the  open  field  to  capture 
by  enemies,  who  had  thus  been  enabled  to  carry  out 
the  threat  that  negro  prisoners  should  be  sold  into 
slavery,  if  not  slaughtered  in  cold  blood.  No  attempt 
at  retaliation  had  been  made  by  our  Government ; 
and  it  looked  as  if,  "  The  confiding  colored  soldiers 
had  been  betrayed  into  bloody  hands."  He  was  soon 
able  to  make  this  complaint  at  the  White  House, 
where  he  also  remonstrated  against  the  delay  in 
rewarding  colored  soldiers  with  commissions,  as  well 
as  in  making  their  pay  equal  to  that  of  the  whites. 
In  this  last  respect,  justice  was  not  done  to  the  negro 
even  by  a  Republican  Congress,  until  the  Fort  Wag 
ner  heroes  had  been  more  than  a  year  under  arms. 
Douglass  was  so  far  satisfied  with  the  goodness  of 
Lincoln's  intentions,  that  he  once  more  made  up  his 
mind  to  get  every  black  man  he  could  into  the  army  ; 
and  he  accepted  the  offer  of  Secretary  Stanton  to 
make  him  assistant  to  General  Lorenzo  Thomas,  who 
was  recruiting  troops  on  the  lower  Mississippi.  A 
commission  as  adjutant  was  promised,  but  it  was 
waited  for  in  vain.  Major  Stearns  went  from  his 


UNION    FOREVER  !  303 

work  in  Massachusetts  and  Pennsylvania  to  raise  ten 
regiments  in  Tennesee  ;  but  he  resigned  his  commis 
sion,  because,  as  he  stated  in  March,  1864,  "  The  Gov 
ernment  has  not  kept  its  faith  with  the  colored  man 
anywhere."  Early  that  year,  Douglass  wrote  him  a 
letter  in  which  he  speaks  thus  of  his  not  having 
joined  General  Thomas,  the  preceding  fall  :  "  I  con 
sider  myself  trifled  with  and  deceived.  How  basely 
have  the  black  troops  of  Massachusetts  been  treated 
by  the  General  Government.  The  dead  heroes  at  Fort 
Wagner  brought  in  debt  for  the  shoes  in  which  they 
fought  and  fell  !  " 

A  full  account  of  his  interview  with  Lincoln  is  given 
in  his  "  Life  and  Times  "  (pp.  384-7):  but  it  is  inter 
esting  also  to  read  what  he  said  about  it  a  few  months 
afterward.  On  Friday,  December  4,  1863,  he  was 
present  at  the  Thirtieth  Anniversary  of  the  A.  A. 
S.  S.,  which  was  held  in  Philadelphia,  in  a  hall  orna 
mented  with  the  American  flag  and  the  motto,*'  Union 
and  Liberty."  Many  familiar  speakers  were  heard 
from  the  platform,  and  several  comparatively  new 
ones.  Among  the  latter  was  Senator  Wilson,  whose 
speech  was  so  well  suited  to  the  times  that  a  demand 
for  three  cheers  was  made  by  a  colored  man  who  had 
sat  hitherto  silent  on  the  platform.  He  was  now  rec 
ognized  ;  and  as  soon  as  the  Senator  had  finished, 
there  were  cries  from  different  parts  of  the  hall  of 
"Douglass  !  Douglass  !  "  Then  he  spoke  on  the  right 
of  the  Southern  negro  to  the  ballot.  During  his 
speech  he  referred  to  the  time  when  he  felt,  on  reach 
ing  Philadelphia,  that  he  was  rubbing  against  the  wall 
of  his  prison  and  could  go  no  farther.  Now  he  was 
able  to  go  back  to  Maryland,  and  even  to  Washington. 


304  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

"  I  have  been  down  there  to  see  the  President ;  and  as  you 
were  not  there,  perhaps  you  may  like  to  know  how  the  President 
of  the  United  States  received  a  black  man  at  the  White  House. 
I  will  tell  you  how  he  received  me — just  as  you  have  seen  one 
gentleman  receive  another  "  (great  applause);  "with  a  hand  and 
a  voice  well-balanced  between  a  kind  cordiality  and  a  respect 
ful  reserve.  I  tell  you  I  felt  big  there."  (Laughter.)  "  Let  me 
tell  you  how  I  got  to  him  ;  because  everybody  can't  get  to  him. 
He  has  to  be  a  little  guarded  in  admitting  spectators.  The 
manner  of  getting  to  him  gave  me  an  idea  that  the  cause  was 
rolling  on.  The  stair-way  was  crowded  with  applicants.  Some 
of  them  looked  eager ;  and  I  have  no  doubt  some  of  them  had 
a  purpose  in  being  there,  and  wanted  to  see  the  President  for 
the  good  of  the  country.  They  were  white ;  and  as  I  was  the 
only  dark  spot  among  them,  I  expected  to  have  to  wait  at  least 
half  a  day  ;  I  had  heard  of  men  waiting  a  week ;  but  in  two  min 
utes  after  I  sent  in  my  card,  the  messenger  came  out,  and  re 
spectfully  invited  '  Mr.  Douglass  '  in.  I  could  hear,  in  the  eager 
multitude  outside  as  they  saw  me  pressing  and  elbowing  my 

way  through,  the  remark, '  Yes,  d n  it,  I  knew  they  would  let 

the  nigger  through,'  in  a  kind  of  despairing  voice — a  Peace  Dem 
ocrat,  I  suppose."  (Laughter.)  "  When  I  went  in,  the  President 
was  sitting  in  his  usual  position,  I  was  told,  with  his  feet  in 
different  parts  of  the  room,  taking  it  easy."  (Laughter.)  "  Don't 
put  this  down,  Mr.  Reporter,  I  pray  you  ;  for  I  am  going  down 
there  again  to-morrow."  (Laughter.)  "  As  I  came  in  and  ap 
proached  him,  the  President  began  to  rise  "  (laughter),  "  and 
he  continued  rising,  until  he  stood  over  me  "  (laughter);  "  and 
reaching  out  his  hand,  he  said,  '  Mr.  Douglass,  I  know  you  ;  I 
have  read  about  you,  and  Mr.  Seward  has  told  me  about  you ; ' 
putting  me  quite  at  ease  at  once. 

"  Now,  you  will  want  to  know  how  I  was  impressed  by  him. 
I  will  tell  you  that,  too.  He  impressed  me  as  being  just  what 
every  one  of  you  have  been  in  the  habit  of  calling  him — an 
honest  man."  (Applause.)  "  I  have  never  met  with  a  man 
who,  on  the  first  blush,  impressed  me  more  entirely  with  his 
sincerity,  with  his  devotion  to  his  country,  and  with  his  determin- 


UNION    FOREVER  !  305 

ation  to  save  it  at  all  hazards."     (Applause.)     "  He   told   me, 
(I  think  he  did  me  more  honor  than  I  deserve,)  that  I  had  made 
a   little   speech  somewhere  in  New  York  and  it  had  got  into 
the  papers,  and  among  the  things  I  had  said  was  this :   that 
if  I  were  called  upon  to  state  what  I  regarded  as  the  most  sad 
and  most  disheartening  feature  in  our  present  political  and  mil 
itary  situation,  it  would  not  be  the  various  disasters  experienced 
by  our  armies  and  our  navies,  on  flood  and  field,  but  it  would 
be  the    tardy,   hesitating,  vacillating    policy   of  the  President 
of  the  United  States.     And  the  President   said   to   me,   '  Mr. 
Douglass,  I  have  been  charged  with  being  tardy,  and  the  like ; ' 
and  he  went  on,  and  partly  admitted  that  he  might  seem  slow; 
but  he  said :   '  I  am  charged  with  vacillating ;  but,  Mr.  Doug 
lass,  I  do  not  think  that  charge  can  be  sustained  ;  I  think    it 
cannot  be  shown  that  when   I  have  once  taken  a  position  I 
have    ever    retreated    from    it.' "     (Applause.)     "  That    I  re 
garded  as   the  most  significant  point  in  what  he  said  during 
our  interview.     I  told  him  that  he  had  been  somewhat  slow 
in  proclaiming  equal  protection  to  our  colored  soldiers  and  pris 
oners  ;  and  he  said  that  the  country  needed  talking  up  to  that 
point.     He  hesitated  in  regard  to   it,  when   he   felt   that    the 
country   was   not    ready  for  it.      He  knew   that   the  colored 
man  throughout  this  country  was    a  despised   man,  a  hated 
man,   and  that  if   he   at   first  came   out   with   such  a  procla 
mation,  all  the  hatred  which  is  poured  on  the  head  of  the  negro 
race  would    be    visited  on   his   administration.     He  said  that 
there  was  preparatory  work  needed,  and  that  that  preparatory 
work  had  now  been  done.     And  he  said,  '  Remember  this,  Mr. 
Douglass ;  remember  that  Milliken's  Bend,  Port  Hudson,  and 
Fort  Wagner  are  recent  events  ;  and  that  these  were  necessary 
to  prepare  the  way   for   this  very  proclamation  of   mine.'     I 
thought  it  was  reasonable,  but  came  to  the  conclusion  that 
while  Abraham  Lincoln  will  not  go  down  to  posterity  as  Abra 
ham  the  Great,  or  as  Abraham  the  Wise,  or  as  Abraham  the 
Eloquent,  although  he  is  all  three — wise,  great,  and  eloquent,  he 
will  go  down  to  posterity  if   the  country  is    saved,  as    Honest 
Abraham"  (Applause);  "and  going  down  thus,  his  name  may 


306  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

be  written  anywhere  in  this  wide  world  of  ours,  side  by  side 
with  that  of  Washington,  without  disparaging  the  latter." 
(Renewed  Applause.) 

In  speaking  of  this  interview,  at  the  Abolitionist 
Reunion,  in  1890,  Douglass  said  that  Lincoln  was 
plainly  aching  to  get  hold  of  slavery,  and  that  after 
asking,  "  Who  is  this  Phillips  who  has  been  pitching 
into  me  ? "  he  added,  "  Well,  tell  him  to  go  on.  Let 
him  make  the  people  willing  to  go  in  for  emancipa 
tion  ;  and  I'll  go  with  them." 

About  this  time  he  delivered,  in  the  hall  where  the 
anniversary  was  celebrated,  a  lecture  which  was 
repeated  in  Boston,  on  February  10,  1864,  and  else 
where  during  the  winter.  His  subject  was,  "  The 
Mission  of  the  War  ;"  and  among  the  opening  sen 
tences  are  these  : 

"  I  look  for  no  miracle  to  abolish  slavery.  The  war  looms 
before  me  simply  as  a  grand  national  opportunity,  which  may 
be  improved  to  national  salvation  or  neglected  to  national 
destruction."  .  .  .  "Our  destiny  is  not  taken  out  of  our  own 
hands  ;  and  it  will  not  do  to  shuffle  off  our  responsibilities  upon 
the  shoulders  of  Providence."  ..."  We  seem  to  have  been 
especially  chosen  to  strike  this  last  blow  to  relieve  the  world  of 
slavery.  We  stand  in  our  lot  to-day  and  wage  war,  not  merely 
for  ourselves  but  for  the  whole  world,  for  unborn  generations 
and  for  all  time." 

His  hearers  ought  to  make  up  their  minds  that  this 
"  shall  be,  and  of  right  ought  to  be  an  abolition  war  ;" 
that  there  shall  be  no  talk  of  any  but  "  an  abolition 
peace;"  that  all  the  slaves,  even  in  loyal  States,  "  shall 
be  at  once  declared  unconditionally  and  forever  free;" 
that  they  "  shall  enjoy  the  most  perfect  civil  and 
political  equality,  including  the  right  of  voting  and 


UNION    FOREVER  !  307 

being  voted  for  ;  that  this  Government  shall  oppose 
all  schemes  for  colonizing  colored  Americans;"  that 
the  people  ought  to  pay  them  equal  wages  and  give 
them  "an  equal  chance  to  rise;"  and  "that  the  free 
dom  and  elevation  of  white  men  are  neither  subserved 
nor  purchased  by  the  degradation  of  black  men,  but 
the  contrary."  ..."  I  warn  the  Union  party  now, 
as  at  the  beginning  of  the  war,  that  if  they  win  they 
are  to  do  so  with  the  aid  of  their  black  cards." 

Two  colored  men  who  had  been  free  before  the 
war,  in  New  Orleans,  and  had  rendered  much  aid  to 
the  Union  cause,  were  sent  as  delegates  in  behalf  of 
their  race  to  Washington,  and  were  invited  to  a  din 
ner  at  the  Parker  House,  in  Boston,  on  April  i?. 
About  eighty  leading  merchants  and  lawyers  met 
them  there  ;  Governor  Andrew  was  in  the  chair ;  the 
John  Brown  song  was  sung;  and  Garrison  spoke  of 
the  nearness  of  the  time  when  the  equality  of  blaqks 
and  whites  would  be  fully  recognized.  Then  the 
chairman  said, "  There  is  one  man  here  who  recog 
nized  that  equality  for  himself  more  than  twenty-five 
years  ago.  And  now  here  sits  *  the  Douglass  in  his 
hall.'  "  Three  cheers  were  then  given  for  Douglass  ; 
and  he  made  a  speech  in  which  he  used  the  words, 
"We  Anglo-Saxons,"  and  added  : 

"  I  see  there  is  some  smiling  at  my  placing  myself  so  con 
spicuously  among  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  ;  but  I  do  it  on  the 
best  Copper-head  authority.  I  was  down  in  Maine  not  long 
ago,  and  made  a  speech  there,  which  some  of  the  Republican 
papers  thought  very  good  to  prove  that  the  negro  had  some 
ideas  as  well  as  other  men  ;  whereupon  the  Copper-head  jour 
nal  came  out — '  Douglass  ?  Why  that  proves  nothing  for  the 
negro  race  ;  his  speech  proves  nothing ;  Douglass  is  a  white 
man. '  Since  then  I  have  sat  on  the  other  side  of  the  house." 


308  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

He  took  no  part  in  the  attempt,  made  soon  after,  to 
set  up  Fremont  as  the  anti-slavery  candidate,  but 
did  his  utmost  to  secure  the  re-election  of  Lincoln. 
The  latter  sent  for  him  that  summer  to  help  organize 
a  plan,  somewhat  like  that  first  proposed  by  John 
Brown,  for  persuading  the  slaves  to  come  more  rap 
idly  into  the  Union  lines  ;  but  such  schemes  were 
soon  rendered  unnecessary  by  the  progress  of  the 
war 

On  the  evening  of  the  day,  when  he  voted  for  Lin 
coln  and  Johnson,  he  was  passing  through  the  streets 
of  Rochester,  when  he  met  four  half-drunken  rowdies 

who  knew  him,  and  shouted,  "  Here  he  is,  the  d n 

nigger."  One  of  them  caught  hold  of  him  ;  but  the 
Douglass  flung  him  off,  and  then  said,  with  uplifted 
arm,  "  Come  on.  I  am  ready  to  settle  this  thing  with 
you,  now  and  here."  They  slunk  away  ;  and  he  went 
on  to  hear  the  news  about  the  election.  He  was 
asked  for  a  speech  ;  and  he  made  merely  this  refer 
ence  to  what  had  just  taken  place  :  "  The  returns  indi 
cate  that  Lincoln  is  elected,  and  I  am  sure  he  is  ;  for 
I  judge  by  the  behavior  of  some  men,  on  the  other 
side,  who  met  me  a  few  minutes  ago." 

He  had  already  declared  that  he  "  had  rather  be 
the  most  whip-scarred  slave  in  all  the  South,  than  the 
haughtiest  master,"  and  in  the  lecture  which  he  deliv 
ered  that  winter  on  "  William  the  Silent,"  he  said: 

"  The  Red  Sea  ever  lies  between  the  pilgrim  and  the  prom 
ised  land.  War,  war,  grim,  stern,  and  terrible,  seems  to  be  the 
inexorable  condition  exacted  for  every  considerable  addition 
to  the  liberties  of  mankind.  The  world  moves,  but  only  by 
fighting  every  inch  of  its  disputed  way.  Right  and  wrong  seem 
equally  endowed  with  fighting  qualities ;  and  if  one  does  not 


UNION    FOREVER  !  309 

prevail,  the  other  will."  ..."  The  line  over  which  oppression 
may  not  go  must  be  marked  with  blood,  first  or  last,  to  be  re 
spected." 

He  went  on  to  Washington  to  see  the  inauguration 
in  1865,  and  was  sitting  in  the  Senate  Gallery  near 
the  close  of  the  session,  when  a  white  man  came  in 
behind  him,  put  his  hand  on  his  shoulder,  and  said 
roughly,  "  What  is  your  name  ?  "  His  first  impulse 
was  to  reply  sternly  ;  but  after  a  glance  at  the  ques 
tioner,  he  said,  "  as  gently  as  any  sucking  dove," 
"Fred  Douglass,  Sir."  "  What  !  the  original  Fred 
Douglass  ? "  "  The  original  Fred  Douglass,  Sir." 
"  Oh,"  faltered  the  would  be  negro-driver,  and  sneaked 
out,  amid  a  general  titter. 

As  he  said  in  his  speech  about  Lincoln,  in  1888  : 

"  I  felt  at  that  time,  there  was  the  spirit  of  murder  here  in 
the  District  of  Columbia  "  ..."  I  kept  close  to  the  carriage 
nearly  up  to  the  hub  in  mud,  for  I  was  afraid,  every  step  we 
took,  that  something  would  happen  to  that  good  and  glorious 
man.  Well,  when  we  got  to  the  east  portico  of  the  Capitol, 
there  I  saw  Mr.  Lincoln  in  his  true  light." 

It  is  to  his  confession,  that  it  would  have  been  just 
and  righteous  for  God  to  permit  the  war  "  to  continue 
till  all  the  wealth  piled  up  by  two  hundred  years  of 
bondage  shall  have  been  wasted,  and  each  drop  of 
blood  drawn  by  the  lash  shall  have  been  paid  for  by 
one  drawn  by  the  sword,"  that  our  orator  refers,  as 
he  goes  on  to  say:  "  Those  words  rang  out  over  that 
throng  ;  and  they  went  over  the  country  as  never  words 
went  before;  and  they  silenced  all  murmurs.  They 
came  down  on  the  land  like  the  summer's  thunder- 
shower  on  the  parched  ground  ;  and  a  new  life  began." 


310  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Just  before  the  ceremony,  he  was  pointed  out  by 
Lincoln  to  Andrew  Johnson,  who  gave  him  a  look 
which  was  plainly,  as  he  said  on  the  spot,  not  that  of 
a  friend  of  the  colored  race.  No  one  of  that  race  had 
ever  ventured  to  attend  a  reception  at  the  White 
House,  and  no  one  would  accompany  him  there  the 
evening  after  the  inauguration.  He  made  up  his 
mind  to  see  that  the  rights  of  his  race  were  recog 
nized,  and  took  his  place  in  the  long  column  which 
entered  the  White  House.  At  the  door  were  two 
policemen  who  seized  him  rudely  by  the  arm,  and 
told  him  to  stand  aside,  for  their  orders  were  to  let 
no  one  of  his  color  in.  It  seemed  to  be  only  the 
White  House  still.  He  assured  them  that  he  was 
personally  known  to  the  President ;  and  then  they 
offered  to  lead  him  in  ;  but  he  was  led  into  a  pas 
sage  by  which  visitors  were  moving  out.  As  soon  as 
he  saw  the  trick,  he  halted,  and  declared  that  he 
should  not  leave  until  he  saw  the  President.  He  was 
soon  able  to  send  in  word,  and  was  admitted.  Long 
before  he  reached  Lincoln,  the  latter,  recognizing  him, 
said,  in  a  loud  voice,  "  Here  comes  my  friend  Doug 
lass,"  and  asked  his  opinion  of  the  inaugural  address, 
which  Douglass  pronounced  "a  sacred  effort."  It 
turned  out  that  no  such  orders  had  been  given  :  the 
officers  were  merely  following  the  old  usage.  "I 
have  found  in  my  experience,"  says  our  author  in 
relating  this  incident,  "  that  the  way  to  break  down 
an  unreasonable  custom,  is  to  contradict  it  in  prac 
tice."  ("  Life  and  Times,"  pp.  405-7.) 

Richmond  was  soon  taken  ;  and  there  was  a  jubilee 
meeting  in  Faneuil  Hall,  on  Tuesday  afternoon,  April 
4.  Among  the  speakers  were  Robert  C.  Winthropand 


UNION  FOREVER!  311 

also  the  colored  man,  who  twenty-five  years  before, 
while  waiting  behind  his  chair  in  New  Bedford,  had 
been  so  entranced  by  his  brilliant  conversation  as 
almost  to  forget  his  duties.  Now  he  had  his  full 
share  of  the  applause  as  he  said  : 

"  I  tell  you  the  negro  is  coming  up.  He  is  rising,  rising. 
Why,  only  a  little  while  ago,  we  were  the  Lazarus  of  the  South  ; 
the  Dives  of  the  South  was  the  slave-holder.  But  now  a 
change  has  taken  place.  That  rich  man  is  lifting  up  his  eyes 
in  torments  down  there,  and  seeing  Lazarus  in  Abraham's 
bosom  ;  and  he  is  all  the  time  calling  on  Father  Abraham  to 
send  Lazarus  back.  But  Father  Abraham  says,  '  If  they  hear 
not  Grant  and  Sherman,  neither  will  they  be  persuaded,  though 
I  send  Lazarus  unto  them  ; '  I  say,  we  are  'way  up  yonder  now, 
no  mistake." 

Eleven  days  later,  he  spoke  at  another  meeting  of  a 
very  different  character,  under  circumstances  which  a 
friend  who  was  present  relates  thus  : 

"  Rochester  Court-house  never  held  a  larger  crowd  than  was 
gathered  to  mourn  over  the  martyred  Lincoln.  The  meeting 
was  opened  by  the  most  eloquent  men  in  the  bar  and  the  pulpit 
with  carefully  prepared  and  earnestly  uttered  addresses.  All 
the  time  the  people  were  not  aroused.  Douglass,  who  told  me 
he  should  not  speak  because  he  was  not  invited,  sat  crowded  in 
the  rear.  At  last  the  feeling  could  be  restrained  no  more  ;  and 
his  name  burst  upon  the  air  from  every  side,  and  filled  the 
house.  The  dignified  gentlemen  who  directed  had  to  surren 
der.  Then  came  the  finest  appeal  in  behalf  of  the  father  of 
his  people,  who  had  died  for  them  especially,  and  would  be 
mourned  by  them  as  long  as  one  remained  in  America  who  had 
been  a  slave.  I  have  heard  Webster  and  Clay  in  their  best 
moments,  Channing  and  Beecher  in  their  hightest  inspirations  ; 
I  never  heard  truer  eloquence  !  I  never  saw  profounder  impres 
sion.  When  he  finished,  the  meeting  was  done." 


CHAPTER   XII. 

THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS. 

MUCH  as  the  colored  man  was  talked  about  by 
members  of  all  parties,  he  was  not  allowed  to  say  much 
for  himself  until  after  the  war.  Then  the  negro  vote 
became  vitally  important,  not  only  for  restoring  the 
South  to  the  Union,  but  for  maintaining  the  supremacy 
of  the  Republicans.  They  have  had  no  more  loyal 
adherents  than  the  followers  of  Douglass.  Hitherto 
he  had  been  nothing  more  than  a  corporal  in  a  for 
lorn  hope  ;  but  now  he  was  the  general  in  command 
of  a  great  army  of  voters.  He  was  right  in  saying 
that  Andrew  Johnson  was  not  the  Moses  of  the 
colored  people,  as  he  called  himself,  but  only  a  would- 
be  Pharaoh.  Their  real  Moses  had  carried  them  safe 
through  the  Red  Sea,  and  is  still  leading  them  to  and 
fro  in  the  wilderness. 

His  possession  of  this  foremost  place  is  largely  due, 
of  course,  to  his  oratory,  in  regard  to  which  Colonel 
T.  W.  Higginson,  who  owes  to  him,  in  great  meas 
ure,  his  defeat  as  candidate  for  a  seat  in  the  present 
Congress,  writes  me  thus  :  "I  have  hardly  heard  his 
equal,  in  grasp  upon  an  audience,  in  dramatic  pres 
entation,  in  striking  at  the  pith  of  an  ethical  ques 
tion,  and  in  single  illustrations  and  images,  as  '  For 
the  negro  the  Republican  party  is  the  deck  ;  all  else 
312 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  313 

is  the  sea.'  '  He  had  shown  himself  a  statesman 
also,  by  choosing  the  very  path  which  finally  led  to 
emancipation.  His  firmness  in  this  course,  in  spite  of 
the  opposition  of  those  who  had  been  his  best  friends, 
displayed  such  an  independence  of  character  as  made 
it  impossible  for  him  to  be  contented  with  merely  fol 
lowing  any  one.  His  advice  on  practical  matters  has 
been  sound  ;  his  treatment  of  difficult  questions  has 
been  so  thorough,  that  a  legal  friend  thinks  he  would, 
with  special  training,  have  made  an  excellent  judge  ; 
and  he  has  never  let  any  thought  of  personal  risk  or 
loss  come  between  him  and  his  people's  cause. 

He  proved  himself  fully  aware  of  what  that  cause 
really  demanded,  when  he  took  part  with  Phillips, 
Foster,  Anna  E.  Dickinson,  and  Remond,  in  defeating, 
by  a  vote  of  more  than  two  to  one,  the  attempt  made 
by  Garrison,  in  New  York,  on  May  9  and  10,  1865,  to 
dissolve  the  American  Anti-Slavery  Society.  Its 
object  could  not  be  said  to  have  been  attained,  even 
in  the  narrowest  sense,  until  the  adoption  of  the 
Thirteenth  Amendment  seven  months  later ;  and 
nothing  would  have  been  better  for  the  colored 
people  than  to  have  had  their  champions  keep  up  an 
organization  without  political  bias  or  party  limits. 

Three  months  later  he  wrote  a  letter,  published  in 
the  "  Liberator "  for  September  29,  and  giving  his 
reasons  for  declining  to  act  as  an  officer  of  the 
"  Educational  Monument  Association."  This  was  a 
plan  for  collecting  money  from  white  people,  as  well 
as  colored,  to  build  a  college  exclusively  for  colored 
people  as  a  Lincoln  memorial.  He  is  decidedly  in 
favor  of  having  his  people  show  their  gratitude  to 
Lincoln  by  erecting  a  monument  with  their  own 


314  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS 

money ;  but  this  scheme  looks  to  him  "  like  an 
attempt  to  wash  the  black  man's  face  in  the  nation's 
tears."  .  .  .  "  I  am  for  washing  the  black  man's 
face,  that  is  educating  his  mind,"  he  says,  but  not  for 
"  sending  around  the  hat  to  a  mourning  public." 
And  then,  again,  "  I  am  not  for  building  up  perma 
nent  separate  institutions  for  colored  people  of  any 
kind,"  but  "am  opposed  to  doing  anything  looking  to 
the  perpetuity  of  prejudice."  .  .  .  "When  I  go  for 
anything,  I  like  to  go  strong  ;  and  when  I  cannot  go 
thus,  I  had  better  not  go  at  all." 

The  willingness  of  the  whites  to  allow  the  colored 
people  to  continue  in  a  degraded  condition  soon 
became  so  apparent,  as  to  make  him  withdraw  his 
opposition  to  associated  efforts  by  his  people  under 
temporary  emergencies.  This  change  of  view  is 
expressly  stated  in  his  address  on  October  i,  at  the 
dedication  of  the  Douglass  Institute,  in  Baltimore. 
He  could  not  but  be  grateful  for  having  his  own 
name  given  to  a  hall  opened  at  the  cost  of  $16,000,  in 
the  city  where  he  had  been  a  slave,  by  an  association 
of  colored  men  for  the  intellectual  culture  of  their 
race  and  his.  Such  institutions  were  peculiarly 
needed  ;  because : 

"  It  is  the  misfortune  of  our  class,  that  it  fails  to  derive  due 
advantage  from  the  achievements  of  its  individual  members." 
.  .  .  "  Wealth,  learning,  and  ability  made  an  Irishman  an  Eng 
lishman.  The  same  metamorphosing  power  converts  a  negro 
into  a  white  man  in  this  country.  When  prejudice  cannot  deny 
the  black  man's  ability,  it  denies  his  race  and  claims  him  as  a 
white  man."  ..."  The  public  has  sternly  denied  the  represen 
tative  character  of  our  distinguished  men.  This  makes  it  nec 
essary  for  the  credit  of  the  colored  people  that  they  should  keep 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  315 

up  institutions,  like  this  one,  where  they  may  feel  themselves 
limited  by  '  no  caste,  or  sect,  or  color,'  where  their  souls  may 
be  thrilled  with  heavenly  music  and  lifted  to  the  skies  on  the 
wings  of  poetry  and  song.  Here  we  can  assemble  and  have 
our  minds  enlightened  upon  the  whole  circle  of  social,  moral, 
political,  and  educational  duties."  .  .  .  "  Here  may  come  all  who 
have  a  new  and  unpopular  truth  to  unfold  and  enforce  "... 
"  Here,  from  this  broad  hall,  shall  go  forth  an  influence  which 
shall  at  last  change  the  current  of  public  contempt." 

This  wicked  feeling  was  encountered  in  the  White 
House,  on  February  7,  1866,  when  a  committee, 
appointed  by  a  colored  convention  of  delegates  from 
twenty  States,  attempted  to  persuade  Johnson  to 
withdraw  his  opposition  against  granting  the  suffrage 
to  freedmen,  or  even  giving  persons  of  every  race  and 
color  full  protection  from  the  laws,  especially  in  the 
form  of  power  to  enforce  contracts,  to  inherit  prop 
erty,  and  to  testify  in  court.  Frederick  Douglass, 
who  appeared  that  day  in  company  with  his  son, 
Lewis,  reminded  Johnson  that  he  had  power  to  bless 
or  blast  a  whole  race,  and  said  :  "  Your  noble  and 
humane  predecessor  placed  in  our  hands  the  sword 
to  assist  in  saving  the  nation  ;  and  we  do  hope  that 
you,  his  able  successor,  will  favorably  regard  the 
placing  in  our  hands  the  ballot  with  which  to  save 
ourselves."  The  ex-slave-holder  replied  by  compar 
ing  himself  to  Moses,  and  complaining  of  so  great  a 
hostility  between  the  poor  whites  and  the  negroes  as 
to  make  it  impossible  to  let  "  both  be  thrown  together 
at  the  ballot-box."  .  .  .  "  The  query  comes  right  there, 
whether  we  don't  commence  a  war  of  races."  He 
also  recommended  the  colored  people  to  leave  the 
country.  His  unwillingness  to  let  any  one  talk  but 


316  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

himself,  was  so  great  as  to  oblige  the  delegation  to 
make  their  reply  in  print.  They  ask  him  :  "  How 
can  you,  in  view  of  your  professed  desire  to  promote 
the  welfare  of  the  black  man,  deprive  him  of  all 
means  of  defense?"  .  .  .  "Can  it  be  that  you  recom 
mend  a  policy  which  would  arm  the  strong  and  cast 
down  the  defenseless  ?  Experience  proves  that  those 
are  most  abused  who  can  be  abused  with  the  greatest 
impunity.  Men  are  whipped  oftenest  who  are 
whipped  easiest.  Peace  between  races  is  not  to  be 
secured  by  giving  power  to  one  race  and  withholding 
it  from  another,  but  by  maintaining  a  state  of  equal 
justice."  It  is  also  shown  that  the  blacks  can  never 
"  be  removed  from  this  country  without  a  terrible 
shock  to  its  prosperity  and  peace,"  and  that  it  would 
be  a  national  infamy  for  them  to  be  "  driven  into  exile, 
for  no  other  cause  than  having  been  freed  from  their 
chains."  ("Life  and  Times,"  pp. .426-8.) 

The  House  of  Representatives  had  already  pro 
posed  an  Amendment  to  the  Constitution,  providing 
that  if  any  State  should  refuse  to  grant  the  ballot  to 
colored  citizens,  its  number  of  Congressmen  should 
be  reduced  proportionately.  Douglass  and  the  other 
delegates  published  a  formal  protest  against  the 
language,  as  implying  the  right  of  a  State  to  dis 
franchise  on  account  of  color  ;  and  they  labored  indi 
vidually  to  impress  this  view  upon  the  Senators.. 
Sum  ner  and  others  declared  that  the  Amendment  did 
not  go  far  enoirgh  ;  while  all  the  Democrats  thought 
it  went  too  far.  As  first  drafted,  it  was  voted  down 
in  the  Senate,  but  was  subsequently  revived  with  an 
introductory  section  which  guaranteed  full  protection 
to  all  persons,  and  forbade  that  the  privileges  of 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  317 

citizens  of  the  United  States  should  be  abridged  by 
any  State.  This  was  all  the  people  were  then  willing 
to  grant  ;  and  it  was  not  until  after  violent  opposi 
tion  in  New  Jersey  and  Ohio,  as  well  as  in  the  White 
House,  that  the  Fourteenth  Amendment  became 
part  of  the  Constitution.  The  guarantee  of  the 
suffrage  had  to  be  left  for  the  Fifteenth,  which  was 
adopted  in  1870  ;  but  care  was  taken  from  the  first, 
that  no  State  which  had  seceded  should  be  allowed 
to  resume  its  functions  until  it  had  effaced  the  color- 
line  from  its  constitution. 

The  final  adoption  of  the  suffrage  amendment  was 
largely  due  to  the  action  of  the  National  Loyalist's 
Convention,  which  met  in  Philadelphia  in  September, 
1866.  Douglass  was  appointed  as  a  delegate  by  his  fel 
low-citizens  of  Rochester,  almost  all  of  whom  were 
white.  They  had  previously  offered  to  nominate  him  for 
Congress  ;  and  Theodore  D.  Weld  had  come  to  the 
city  to  urge  him  to  accept  the  honor  ;  but  he  had 
refused,  on  the  ground  that  he  should  probably  be 
defeated  and  his  failure  would  injure  the  cause.  He 
did,  however,  set  out  for  Philadelphia  ;  but  other 
delegates  on  the  same  train  sent  a  committee  to 
represent  to  him  that  his  recognition,  as  a  member, 
would  fatally  injure  the  Republican  party  at  the  elec 
tions  for  Congress  that  fall,  and  the  good  of  his 
people's  cause  required  him  to  give  up  going.  He 
replied  that  they  might  as  well  ask  him  to  blow  out 
his  own  brains.  The  only  result  of  his  staying  away, 
to  the  party,  would  be  its  condemnation  for  hypoc 
risy  and  cowardice.  "  But  ignoring  the  question  of 
policy  entirely,  and  looking  at  it  as  one  of  right  and 
wrong,  I  am  bound  to  go  into  that  convention  ;  not  to 


318  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

do  so  would  contradict  the  principle  and  practice  of 
my  life." 

When  he  met  with  the  other  members  at  Indepen 
dence  Hall,  where  they  were  to  organize  for  marching 
two  by  two  through  Philadelphia,  he  was  very  coldly 
received  by  most  of  the  delegates  ;  but  General  But 
ler  and  a  few  others  were  cordial.  He  had  been  told 
the  night  before  that  he  would  not  be  allowed  in  the 
procession,  lest  it  should  be  mobbed  ;  he  was  the 
only  colored  member,  and  it  seemed  likely  that  he 
"must  walk  alone  if  he  went  at  all.  Theodore  Tilton, 
then  an  influential  editor,  volunteered  to  take  his 
arm  ;  and  his  presence  in  the  procession  called  out 
nothing  but  applause.  During  the  march  he  received 
a  cordial  greeting  from  the  daughter  of  his  former 
mistress,  Mrs.  Lucretia  Auld.  The  convention  was 
soon  found  to  be  fatally  divided  on  the  suffrage 
question,  and  the  president  finally  declared  it  ad 
journed.  It  was  at  once  re-organized,  however,  and 
earnest  speeches  in  favor  of  enfranchisement  were 
made  by  Miss  Dickinson  as  well  as  by  Douglass. 

What  the  latter  thought  about  the  questions  of  the 
hour,  may  be  judged  from  the  following  account  by 
Miss  Holley,  of  his  speech  the  next  summer  : 

"  The  first  day  of  August,  1867, 1  joined  a  party  of  ladies  and 
gentlemen  to  hear  Frederick  Douglass  speak  at  Watkins,  N.  Y. 
It  was  an  open  air  meeting,  with  an  audience  of  two  thousand 
people.  When  Douglass  was  demanding  for  the  negro  equality 
before  the  law,  that  government  should  know  no  distinction  of 
color,  no  white,  no  black  man,  a  man  in  the  audience  cried  out, 
'  That's  a  damnable  sentiment.'  To  which  Douglass  replied, 
'  Take  care  ;  lest  it  damn  you  ! '  The  negro  had  been  thought 
1  a  natural  born  Christian.'  "  "  '  If  you  smite  him  on  one  cheek, 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  319 

he  will  turn  the  other  also  ; '  but  the  war  had  shown  he  would 
fight.  He  was  philosopher  enough  not  to  fight  when  he  had 
no  reasonable  prospect  of  whipping  anybody.  Douglass  liked 
people  who  would  fight — didn't  admire  sheep-like  natures. 
Fighting  was  the  most  respectable  thing  in  the  country.  The 
man  who  could  fight  the  best  was  most  likely  to  be  President. 

"  The  Copper-heads  were  saying  all  over  the  country  that  he 
was  no  negro.  '  Then,'  said  he,  '  as  a  white  man  I  have  no 
objection  to  negro  equality  before  the  law.'  He  did  not  believe 
it  would  lessen  his  chances  for  the  Presidency !  The  negro 
would  not  refuse  him  his  vote  on  account  of  his  complexion. 
The  negro  race  were  in  this  country,  and  here  they  would  re 
main  ;  it  was  inevitable.  They  would  not  wear  out ;  they  would 
not  die  out ;  and,  now  slavery  is  abolished,  they  would  not  fade 
out.  The  question  was,  should  they  remain  as  a  blessing  or  a 
curse  ?  Those  Democrats  in  the  Constitutional  Convention  at 
Albany,  laboring  to  keep  equal  rights  from  the  negro  by  urging 
a  separate  vote  on  the  suffrage  amendment,  were  trying  to  pre 
serve  the  accursed  system  of  slavery.  He  spoke  of  white-coated 
Greeley  and  the  noble  character  of  Gerrit  Smith  being  thrust  be 
tween  miserable  Jeff.  Davis  and  the  honest,  hot  indignation  of 
the  North.  Douglass  did  not  like  it ;  did  not  think  we  ought 
to  forget  what  Jeff.  Davis  had  done  ;  his  release  was  an  out 
rage.  Douglass  believed  the  Almightly  gave  us  memory  for  a 
purpose — to  remember  just  such  things.  Even  Christianity 
did  not  ask  us  to  forgive  without  repentance.  Douglass  didn't 
wish  to  forget  Andersonville,  Belle  Isle,  Libby  Prison.  All 
over  the  country,  on  the  cars  and  in  steamboats,  in  city  streets, 
in  private  homes,  he  met  wounded  and  crippled  soldiers,  maimed 
and  marred,  armless,  legless  men,  marks  of  Jeff.  Davis's  crime 
and  malignant  character.  A  government  that  don't  hate  trait 
ors,  can't  love  loyal  men.  This  Government  does  not  know  how 
to  punish  traitors.  A  man  who  loves  liberty  strongest  and 
best  is  the  one  who  hates  and  detests  slavery  and  treason  the 
worst.  The  negro  owes  nothing  to  the  Republican  party, 
nothing  to  the  popular  religion  of  this  country.  Douglass 
thought  this  Government  had  as  much  reason  to  be  grateful  to 


320  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

the  negro,  as  the  negro  had  to  be  grateful  to  this  Government. 
Abraham  Lincoln  did  not  let  the  oppressed  go  free  until  the 
safety  of  this  Government  demanded  it.  Like  Pharaoh  of  old, 
it  was  the  awful  suffering  that  came  upon  him.  Emancipation 
was  owing  to  the  irresistible  logic  of  events.  The  negro  owed 
gratitude  and  thanks  to  Almighty  God. 

"  Douglass  then  introduced  his  newly  arrived,  dear  brother, 
Perry,  from  whom  he  had  been  separated  forty  years.  He  had 
often  tried  to  find  him  ;  had  sent  agents  down  South  again  and 
again,  but  never  could  get  any  trace  of  him.  Slavery  hid  him 
away  forty  years — whelmed  him  in  its  loathsome,  bitter  flood. 
He  spoke  of  his  unspeakable  joy  in  his  being  restored  to  him 
again.  The  sight  of  those  two  long-parted  brothers  standing 
side  by  side — one  with  his  culture  and  courage,  the  other  in 
his  truth  and  affection — moved  the  audience  to  tears.  It  seemed 
a  picture  for  an  artist.  It  was  the  first  time  Perry  ever  heard 
Frederick  make  a  public  speech  ;  it  was  a  great  event  to  him. 
Perry  said  he  was  in  Texas  when  emancipation  was  proclaimed, 
and  overheard  his  master  say  he  had  run  his  property  into 
Texas  and  then  he  could  run  it  into  Cuba.  Then  Perry  said 
he  knew  something  was  wrong  about  master,  and  he  made 
up  his  '  mind  never  to  go  on  the  water.'  Perry  was  older 
than  Frederick,  and  smaller  and  darker.  He  went  to  reside  in 
Rochester  near  his  brother.  His  honest  face  won  interest  and 
confidence  at  first  sight,  which  his  good-sense  and  religious 
trust  confirmed." 

Earnestly  as  the  Douglass  threw  himself  into  the 
battle  for  the  ballot,  he  was  not  indifferent  to  the 
sight  of  injustice  anywhere.  The  outrages  upon  the 
Chinese  made  him  accept  them  as  sufferers  from  the 
same  prejudices  as  his  own  people  ;  and  he  under 
took  to  defend  both  races  by  the  same  noble  argu 
ments.  The  lecture  which  he  delivered  in  1867  before 
the  Parker  Fraternity,  in  Boston,  is  entitled  "  The 
Composite  Nation  ;"  and  he  maintains  that  our  ca- 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  321 

pacity  to  become  "  the  most  perfect  national  illustra 
tion  of  the  unity  and  dignity  of  the  human  family,"  is 
largely  due  to  our  being  "  the  most  conspicuous 
example  of  composite  nationality  in  the  world."  In 
Wales  and  the  Highlands  of  Scotland,  the  people 
boast  that  they  are  of  pure  blood  and  were  never 
conquered  ;  "  but  no  man  can  contemplate  them 
without  wishing  that  they  had  been  conquered." 
Only  one-fifth  of  the  population  of  the  globe  are 
white,  and  are  they  to  turn  out  the  other  four-fifths 
everywhere  ?  "I  know  of  no  rights  of  race  superior 
to  the  rights  of  humanity."  The  Chinese  are  likely 
to  be  even  more  difficult  to  deal  with  than  the  negro. 
The  latter  "  took  his  pay  in  religion  and  the  lash.  The 
Chinaman  is  a  different  article,  and  will  want  the 
cash."  He  "  has  notions  of  justice  that  are  not  to  be 
confused  or  bewildered  by  any  of  our  *  Cursed  be 
Canaan  '  religion." 

"  Chattel-slavery,  kingcraft,  priestcraft,  pious  frauds,  intoler 
ance,  persecution,  suicide,  assassination,  repudiation,  and  a 
thousand  other  errors  and  crimes  have  all  had  their  defenses 
and  apologies.  Prejudice  of  race  and  color  has  been  equally 
fortunate.  The  two  best  arguments  in  its  defense  are,  first,  the 
worthlessness  of  the  classes  against  which  it  is  directed,  and, 
second,  that  the  feeling  itself  is  entirely  natural.  The  way  for 
any  people  to  overcome  the  first  argument  is,  to  begin  to  work 
for  the  elevation  of  those  they  have  deemed  worthless,  and  thus 
make  them  worthy  of  regard ;  and  they  will  soon  become 
worthy  and  not  worthless.  As  to  the  natural  argument  it  may 
be  said  that  nature  has  many  sides.  Many  things  are,  in  a 
certain  sense,  natural,  which  are  neither  wise  nor  best.  It  is 
natural  to  walk  ;  but  should  men,  therefore,  refuse  to  ride  ?  It 
is  natural  to  ride  on  horseback;  shall  men,  therefore,  refuse 
steam  and  rail  ?  Civilization  is  itself  a  constant  war  upon 


322  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

some  forces  in  nature  ;  shall  we,  therefore,  abandon  civilization 
and  go  back  to  savage  life  ?  Nature  has  two  voices  :  the  one 
is  high,  the  other  low ;  one  is  in  sweet  accord  with  reason  and 
justice,  the  other  is  apparently  at  war  with  both.  The  more 
men  really  know  of  the  essential  nature  of  things,  and  of  the 
true  relation  of  mankind,  the  freer  they  are  from  prejudices  of 
every  kind.  The  child  is  afraid  of  the  giant  form  of  his  own 
shadow^ ;  it  is  natural ;  but  he  will  part  with  his  fears  when  he  is 
older  and  wiser.  So  ignorance  is  full  of  prejudice,  but  it  will 
disappear  with  enlightenment.  But  I  pass  on.  I  have  said 
that  the  Chinese  will  come,  and  have  given  some  reasons  why 
we  may  expect  them  in  very  large  numbers  in  no  very  distant 
future.  Do  you  ask  if  I  would  favor  such  immigration  ?  I 
answer,  I  would.  Would  you  admit  them  as  witnesses  in  our 
courts  of  law  ?  I  would.  Would  you  have  them  naturalized, 
and  have  them  invested  with  all  the  rights  of  American  citizen 
ship  ?  I  would.  Would  you  allow  them  to  vote  ?  I  would. 
W7ould  you  allow  them  to  hold  office  ?  I  would.  .  .  . 

"  Our  Republic  is  itself  a  strong  argument  in  favor  of  cosmop 
olite  nationality.  It  is  no  disparagement  to  Americans  of 
English  descent,  to  affirm  that  much  of  the  wealth,  leisure,  cul 
ture,  refinement,  and  civilization  of  the  country  are  due  to  the 
arm  of  the  negro  and  the  muscle  of  the  Irishman.  Without 
these  races,  and  the  wealth  created  by  their  sturdy  toil,  English 
civilization  had  still  lingered  this  side  of  the  Alleghanies,  and 
the  wolf  would  still  be  howling  on  their  summits.  To  no  class 
of  our  population  are  we  more  indebted  for  valuable  qualities 
of  head,  heart,  and  hand  than  to  the  Germans.  Say  what  we 
will  of  their  lager,  their  smoke,  and  their  metaphysics,  they 
have  brought  to  us  a  fresh,  vigorous,  and  child-like  nature,  a 
boundless  faculty  in  the  acquisition  of  knowledge,  a  subtle  and 
far-reaching  intellect,  and  a  fearless  love  of  truth.  Though 
remarkable  for  patient  and  laborious  thought,  the  true  German 
is  a  joyous  child  of  freedom,  fond  of  manly  sports,  a  lover  of 
music,  and  a  happy  man  generally.  Though  he  never  forgets 
that  he  is  a  German,  he  never  fails  to  remember  that  he  is  an 
American.  . 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  323 

"  But  it  is  said  that  the  Chinaman  is  a  heathen,  and  that  he 
will  introduce  his  heathen  rights  and  superstitions  here.  This 
is  the  last  objection  which  should  come  from  those  who  profess 
the  all  conquering  power  of  Christian  religion.  If  that  religion 
cannot'  stand  contact  with  the  Chinese  religion,  or  no  religion, 
so  much  the  worse  for  those  who  have  adopted  it.  It  is  the 
Chinaman,  not  the  Christian,  who  should  be  alarmed  for  his 
faith.  He  exposes  that  faith  to  great  dangers  by  exposing  it  to 
the  freer  air  of  America.  But  shall  we  send  missionaries  to  the 
heathen,  and  yet  deny  the  heathen  the  right  to  come  to  us  ?  I 
think  that  a  few  honest  believers  in  the  teachings  of  Confucius 
would  be  well  employed  in  expounding  his  doctrines  amongst 
us.  ... 

"  Let  the  Chinaman  come ;  he  will  help  to  augment  the  na 
tional  wealth.  He  will  help  to  develop  our  boundless  resources  ; 
he  will  help  to  pay  off  our  national  debt.  He  will  help  to  lighten 
the  burden  of  our  national  taxation.  He  will  give  us  the  bene- 
rit  of  his  skill  as  a  manufacturer  and  as  a  tiller  of  the  soil,  in 
which  he  is  unsurpassed.  Even  the  matter  of  religious  liberty, 
which  has  cost  the  world  more  tears,  more  blood,  and  more 
agony  than  any  other  interest,  will  be  helped  by  his  presence. 
I  know  of  no  church,  however  tolerant,  of  no  priesthood,  how 
ever  enlightened,  which  could  be  safely  trusted  with  the  tremen 
dous  power  which  universal  conformity  would  confer.  We 
should  welcome  all  men  of  every  shade  of  religious  opinion,  as 
among  the  best  means  of  checking  the  arrogance  and  intoler 
ance  which  are  the  almost  inevitable  concomitants  of  general 
conformity.  Liberty  always  flourishes  best  amid  the  clash  and 
competition  of  rival  religious  creeds." 

Active  support  was  given  in  1868  by  Douglass  and 
other  colored  men  to  General  Grant,  not  merely  be 
cause  he  had  been  a  firm  friend  to  their  race,  but 
because  his  opponent  had  failed  to  put  down  the 
draft-riot,  in  which  their  orphan  asylum  was  burned. 
A  friend  of  mine  was  sitting  in  a  parlor-car  when  the 


324  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

porter  came  by,  offering  to  embellish  the  boots  of  the 
passengers  with  either  a  Grant  polish  or  a  Seymour 
shine,  whichever  they  might  prefer.  "  No,"  said  she, 
"  when  the  colored  orphan  asylum  was  burned  in 
New  York,  that  was  a  Seymour  shine  !" 

How  fully  Douglass  shared  this  view  may  be  judged 
from  the  speech  he  made  the  year  previous  at  Wat- 
kins,  as  well  as  from  that  which  was  delivered  at 
Arlington  on  Decoration  Day,  1871,  and  which  is 
printed  in  his  "  Life  and  Times  "  (pp.  461-3).  It  was 
then  that  he  said,  "We  are  not  here  to  applaud 
manly  courage,  save  as  it  has  been  displayed  in  a 
noble  cause." 

In  1869  he  left  Rochester,  where  he  had  resided 
since  1847,  and  became  editor  of  a  Washington 
weekly,  the  "  New  National  Era,"  started  for  the 
especial  benefit  of  the  colored  people.  Their  ablest 
men  contributed  to  it  ;  but  it  was  not  a  pecuniary 
success,  either  under  his  management  or  that  of  his 
sons,  to  whom  he  handed  it  over  in  1872.  It  was 
discontinued  in  1875,  after  it  had  cost  him  nearly  ten 
thousand  dollars.  Subsequent  investments  have 
been  more  fortunate. 

During  his  three  years  of  editorship,  Grant  at 
tempted  to  annex  San  Domingo  ;  and  Charles  Sum- 
ner  maintained  that  the  President  had  violated  the 
Constitution,  by  using  our  navy  to  keep  in  power  a 
usurper  who  wanted  to  sell  his  country,  and  also  by 
threatening  to  make  war  upon  Hayti,  which  opposed 
the  scheme  as  dangerous  to  its  own  independence. 
The  measure  failed  to  secure  the  support  of  our  peo 
ple,  and  our  politics  would  certainly  not  have  been 
made  any  purer  by  the  imposition  upon  Congress  of 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  325 

the  task  of  governing  a  province  in  which  there  was 
scarcely  a  single  native  who  could  speak  English  or 
read  any  language.  Douglass  has  favored  the  scheme 
as  necessary  to  ensure  a  good  government  there  ;  and 
this  he  found,  as  he  states  in  an  unpublished  lecture, 
to  be  "  the  opinion  of  the  most  intelligent  men  in  the 
island."  His  visit  was  made  on  board  of  our  man-of- 
war,  the  Tennessee,  as  secretary  to  a  Commission 
composed  of  Senator  Wade,  Dr.  S.  G.  Howe,  and  ex- 
President  White,  of  Cornell.  He  was  treated,  as  Mr. 
White  informs  me,  with  every  honor  by  the  Com 
missioners  as  well  as  by  the  naval  officers  ;  but  as 
they  returned  to  Washington  by  a  Potomac  steamer, 
on  March  27,  1871,  he  was  forbidden  a  place  at  the 
supper-table,  whereupon  Mr.  White  and  Dr.  Howe 
refused  to  take  one.  This  made  it  unfortunate 
that  he  was  not  invited  to  dinner  with  the  Com 
missioners  at  the  White  House,  though  the  omis 
sion  did  not  seem  to  him  so  important  as  it  did  to 
Sumner. 

He  was  appointed  a  councillor  or  member  of  the 
upper  house  of  the  legislature  of  the  District  of 
Columbia,  soon  after  by  Grant,  who  was  indebted  to 
him  for  the  colored  vote  in  1872.  He  met  the  repre 
sentations  of  Sumner  and  other  friends  of  liberty, 
that  Grantism  had  become  synonymous  not  only 
with  despotism  but  with  corruption,  by  asserting  that 
the  Democratic  party  was  still  the  negro's  enemy.  In 
the  speech  with  which  he  opened  the  campaign  in 
April,  at  New  Orleans,  he  told  a  story  of  a  man  who 
was  riding  a  mule  that  put  its  foot  into  the  stirrup 
in  its  efforts  to  throw  him.  Then  he  said  :  "  Faith, 
and  if  you  are  a  trying  to  get  on,  it  is  time  for  me  to 


326  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

get  off."  Thus  Greeley  was  the  saddle  into  which  the 
Democratic  party  was  trying  to  climb,  and  it  seemed 
time  to  jump  off. 

The  national  colored  convention  at  New  Orleans 
"  pretty  largely  agreed  with  me  ; "  and  he  continued 
to  take  an  active  part  in  the  campaign  until  its  close. 
His  activity  was  not  seriously  interrupted  by  the  burn 
ing,  early  in  June,  of  the  house  which  he  still  retained 
in  Rochester — a  loss  especially  to  be  regretted,  because 
it  involved  that  of  the  only  complete  files  in  existence 
of  his  "Weekly"  and  "Monthly."  Many  other  materials 
which  would  have  been  of  great  value  to  history  as  well 
as  biography,  perished  in  the  flames.  Among  the  States 
where  he  appeared  on  the  stump,  that  summer  or  fall, 
were  North  Carolina,  Virginia,  and  Maine.  New 
York  put  his  name,  as  Elector  at  large,  at  the  head  of 
her  ticket  ;  and  the  honor  of  carrying  the  electoral 
vote  of  the  State  to  Washington  was  given  soon  after 
to  a  member  of  the  race  which  had  once  been  forbid 
den  by  law  to  handle  an  ordinary  mail-bag. 

Unwilling  as  Douglass  was  to  follow  even  Sumner 
blindly,  he  never  ceased  to  be  grateful  to  the  Senator 
who  had  been  foremost  in  the  battle  for  the  oppressed. 
They  dined  together  at  least  once  a  week,  and  were 
often  seen  walking  arm-in-arm  in  the  Senate  Chamber. 
One  man,  who  was  sent  there  by  Rhode  Island,  used 
to  say,  "When  I  see  Fred  Douglass  come  in  among 
us,  I  am  ashamed  to  be  sitting  in  my  place  ;  and  it  is 
not  because  I  care  anything  for  Sambo  either."  No 
white  man  at  Washington  cared  more  for  Sambo 
then  the  Senator  whom  Douglass  defended  to  the  face 
of  a  President  who  called  Sumner  mad.  He  delights 
still  to  remember  how  his  "  No  "  in  the  Senate,  "  went 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  327 

up  to  the  dome  ;  "  and,  even  while  opposing  his  views 
in  the  New  Orleans  convention,  he  said  : 

"  There  is  now  a  man  at  Washington  who  represents  the  fu 
ture,  and  is  a  majority  in  himself — a  man  at  whose  feet  Grant 
learns  wisdom.  That  man  is  Charles  Sumner.  I  know  them 
both.  They  are  great  men  ;  but  Sumner  is  steady  as  the  North 
Star :  he  is  no  flickering  light.  For  twenty-five  years  he  has 
worked  for  the  Republican  party,  and  I  hope  I  may  cease  for 
ever,  if  I  cease  to  give  all  honor  to  Charles  Sumner." 

He  has  also  said  that,  "  As  a  man  of  integrity  and 
truth,  Charles  Sumner  was  high  above  suspicion  ; 
and  not  all  the  Grants  in  Christendom  will  rob  him 
of  this  well-earned  character." 

The  colored  people  of  Tennessee  now  invited  their 
leader  to  tell  them  what  he  knew  about  farming  ;  and 
he  began  his  speech  at  their  fair,  at  Nashville,  Sep 
tember  18,  1873,  by  saying,  "  I  have  been  all  my  life 
long  doing  extraordinary  things  for  the  first  time 
some  of  which  had  been  better  undone."  He  pro 
ceeded  to  make  many  practical  suggestions  :  for 
instance,  that  "  the  primary  conditions  of  peace,  pu 
rity,  and  order  in  your  household,"  consisted  in  an 
"ample  supply  of  wood  and  water."  He  reminded  his 
brethren  that  the  pressing  question  was  "  whether 
the  black  man  will  prove  a  better  master  to  himself 
than  his  white  master  was  to  him."  .  .  .  "We  are 
to  prove  that  we  can  better  our  own  condition."  One 
way  to  do  this  is,  "Accumulate  property.  This  may 
sound  to  you  like  a  new  gospel.  You  have  been 
accustomed  to  hear  that  money  is  the  root  of  all 
evil,  etc."  ...  "  On  the  other  hand,  property, 
money  if  you  please,  will  purchase  for  us  the  only 


328  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

condition  upon  which  any  people  can  rise  to  the  dig 
nity  of  genuine  manhood,  for  without  property,  there 
can  be  no  leisure  :  without  leisure,  there  can  be  no 
thought :  without  thought,  there  can  be  no  invention  : 
without  invention  there  can  be  no  progress." 

On  his  way  back  from  speaking  thus,  he  and  his 
son,  Frederick,  resisted  an  attempt  to  order  them  out 
of  the  cars  ;  and  their  success  justified  his  words  at 
the  fair,  "  Our  destiny  is  in  our  own  hands." 

His  exhortations  to  his  people  to  save  money  lost 
much  of  their  effect  in  consequence  of  the  failure, 
that  fall,  of  the  Freedman's  Savings  and  Trust  Com 
pany.  This  bank  had  been  established  in  1865  at 
Washington,  for  the  benefit  of  the  colored  people, 
under  the  supervision  of  Congress.  In  1872  it  had 
thirty-four  branches  in  various  States,  and  had  re 
ceived  more  than  as  many  millions  of  dollars  in 
deposits.  It  had,  however,  made  some  bad  loans  ; 
and  its  president,  Frederick  Douglass,  had  said  in  a 
letter,  dated  April  30, 1871,  "  I  have  married  a  corpse." 
He  finally  felt  it  his  duty  to  impart  his  suspicions  to 
the  Finance  Committee  of  the  Senate  ;  and  they 
agreed  with  him  that  it  was  better  to  close  the  bank. 
I  have  heard  that  it  might  have  weathered  the  storm, 
if  no  shock  had  been  thus  openly  given  to  its  credit. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  Douglass  acted  to  the  best  of 
his  judgment  in  the  interest  of  the  depositors,  whom 
he  was  bound  to  protect  ;  and  it  is  difficult  to  see,, 
whether  they  would  have  lost  more  or  less  if  he  had 
acted  otherwise.  The  result  was  unfortunate,  not 
only  to  his  own  influence,  but  to  that  of  the  Repub 
lican  party  over  the  freedmen  ;  and  these  latter 
suffered  by  the  conversion  of  an  encouragement  to 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  329 

industry  and  economy  into  a  temptation  to  idleness 
and  extravagance. 

It  is  pleasant  to  turn  from  this  disaster,  and  re 
member  that  this  was  the  year  in  which  he  was 
elected  a  member  of  the  lower  branch  of  the  District 
Legislature,  and  in  which  he  first  told  how  he  had 
escaped  from  slavery.  The  story  was  going  the 
rounds  of  the  press  in  April,  and  that  summer  he 
wrote  the  John  Brown  lecture,  which  was  delivered 
for  the  first  time  in  Charlestown,  Mass.,  on  Decem 
ber  9,  1873.  Six  days  later  he  was  one  of  the 
speakers  at  the  meeting  held  by  the  Woman  Suffrage 
Association  of  New  England,  in  Faneuil  Hall,  on  the 
one  hundredth  anniversary  of  the  Boston  Tea  Party. 

The  victory  of  the  Republicans  in  1872  was  the 
most  sweeping  they  have  ever  gained.  Since  then 
they  have  had  only  a  small  majority,  or  none,  in  the 
popular  vote  for  President  ;  but  that  year  their 
majority  of  votes  was  about  one-ninth.  Grant  carried 
thirty-one  States,  out  of  which  only  nineteen  went 
for  Garfield  in  1880  ;  and  the  change  in  the  number 
of  electors  was  from  286  in  1872  to  the  185  of  whom 
some  were  claimed  by  the  Democrats  in  1876.  This 
falling  off  was  largely  due  to  losing  most  of  the  negro 
vote  ;  and  it  is  worth  while  to  remember  that  this  loss 
took  place  immediately  after  a  great  Republican 
victory,  while  not  only  the  White  House  but  the 
Capitol  was  in  full  possession  of  a  party  which  had 
been  doing  its  utmost  to  protect  thefreedmen  against 
the  Ku  Klux,  and  while  federal  troops  were  upholding 
the  candidates  supported  for  governor  and  members 
of  the  legislature  by  the  colored  people  of  Louisiana, 
against  the  nominees  of  the  "white  man's  party." 


33°  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Why  the  negro  lost  the  franchise,  while  his  own  party 
was  at  the  height  of  power  and  doing  its  utmost 
to  sustain  him,  may  easily  be  imagined  from  what  is 
said  by  the  "  first  colored  member  of  the  Ohio  Legis 
lature  and  late  Judge  Advocate  of  the  Grand  Army 
of  the  Republic,"  Mr.  G.  W.  Williams,  in  his  "  History 
of  the  Negro  Race  in  America."  Vol.  ii,  pp.  527-8. 

"  It  was  to  be  regretted  that  the  negro  had  been  so  uncere 
moniously  removed  from  Southern  politics;  hut  such  a  result 
was  inevitable.  The  Government  gave  him  the  statute-book 
when  he  ought  to  have  had  the  spelling-book,  placed  him  in  the 
legislature  when  he  ought  to  have  been  in  the  school-house. 
In  the  great  revolution  that  followed  the  war,  the  heels  were  put 
where  the  brains  ought  to  have  been.  An  ignorant  majority, 
without  competent  leaders,  could  not  rule  an  intelligent  Cauca 
sian  minority.  Ignorance,  vice,  poverty,  and  superstition  could 
not  rule  intelligence,  experience,  wealth,  and  organization."  .  .  . 
"  It  was  an  immutable  and  inexorable  law  which  demanded  the 
destruction  of  those  governments.  It  was  a  law  that  knows  no 
country,  no  nationality."  ..."  But  a  lesson  was  taught  the 
colored  people  that  is  invaluable.  Let  them  rejoice  that  they 
are  out  of  politics." 

Douglass  admits  in  the  "  North  American  Review," 
for  July,  1884,  that  the  colored  voter  had  been  car 
ried  "  to  an  altitude  unsuited  to  his  attainments," 
and  General  S.  C.  Armstrong  declares  of  the  people 
for  whom  he  is  laboring  that  "  Their  present  unfit- 
ness,  as  a  class,  to  use  their  power  is  such  that  they 
will  not  be  allowed,  even  in  the  States  in  which  they 
have  the  majority,  to  assume  political  control."  It 
was  found  necessary  by  a  Republican  Congress  to 
disfranchise  them,  in  company  with  the  other  inhabi 
tants  of  the  District  of  Columbia  in  1874,  and  the 


THE    LEADER    IN    POLITICS.  331 

suffrage  has  not  been  restored  there.  Men  who  had 
helped  the  freedmen  to  the  ballot  were  bitterly  dis 
appointed  at  rinding  it  used  by  unscrupulous  white 
adventurers,  as  a  weapon  for  robbing  tax-payers  in 
discriminately.  It  is  certainly  a  great  pity  that  Con 
gress  did  not  keep  within  the  line  drawn  by  President 
Lincoln  three  days  before  his  death,  when  he  sug 
gested  that  "  The  elective  franchise  might  be  con 
ferred  on  the  very  intelligent  of  the  colored  men,  and 
on  those  who  served  in  our  cause  as  soldiers."  It  is 
particularly  unfortunate  to  have  had  the  power  of 
Mr.  Douglass  as  a  political  leader  weakened  by  dis 
regard  of  his  own  principle,  "  The  true  basis  of 
rights  is  the  capacity  of  individuals." 

He  did  not  falter  in  the  faith  declared  in  a  letter 
which  was  the  only  one  selected  to  be  read  aloud  at 
the  Centennial  Celebration  of  the  Concord  Fight,  on 
April  19,  1875,  and  which  rejoiced  in  our  possession 
of  "  a  liberty  in  presence  of  which  no  privileged 
classes  of  wealth  or  religion,  race  or  color  can  long 
endure."  When  he  spoke  soon  afterward  at  the  one 
hundredth  anniversary  of  the  formation  of  the  Aboli 
tion  Society  of  Pennsylvania,  he  said  :  "  I  know  of  no 
one  period  in  the  world's  history  for  wrhich  I  would 
exchange  the  present."  And  he  urged  the  need  of 
giving  to  the  black  man  "  knowledge  to  use  his  suf 
frage  in  such  a  manner  as  to  preserve  his  own  liberty 
and  the  highest  welfare  of  the  Government."  In  a 
speech  to  his  own  people  on  July  5,  1875,  at  Hills- 
dale,  near  Washington,  he  warns  them  "  to  be  on  their 
guard  against  the  swarm  of  white  beggars  who 
sweep  the  country  in  the  name  of  the  colored  race." 

A   few  months  earlier,  he  and   other  colored  men 


332  FREDERICK  DOUQLASS. 

passed  a  resolution  threatening  that  the  South  would 
be  full  of  "  rapine,  blood,  and  fire,"  if  the  Senate  did 
not  pass  the  Civil  Rights  Bill,  since  found  by  the 
Supreme  Court  to  violate  the  Constitution  in  giving 
to  the  national  Government  functions  which  belong 
to  the  States. 

March,  1876,  he  spoke  at  a  meeting  got  up  nomin 
ally  for  serenading  Senator  Morton,  of  Indiana,  but 
really  for  rebuking  those  Republicans  who  had  re 
fused  to  give  a  seat  in  either  House  of  Congress  to  a 
mulatto,  whose  title  and  character  were  severely  criti 
cized  by  the  independent  press.  That  June  the 
committee  on  credentials  of  the  Republican  National 
Convention  reported  against  recognizing  what  was 
called  "  the  Boss  Shepherd  and  Fred  Douglass 
delegation."  His  wish  to  have  either  Morton  or 
Conkling  nominated  was  not  fulfilled  ;  and  the  zeal 
with  which  he  took  part  in  sending  Butler  to  fight 
for  negro  suffrage  in  Congress,  was  soon  repaid  by  the 
General's  getting  himself  made  Democratic  governor 
of  Massachusetts.  Whatever  we  may  think  about  the 
purity  and  wisdom  of  the  Stalwarts,  we  must  honor  the 
motives  which  have  made  the  Douglass  follow  their 
banner  no  less  loyally  after  it  ceased  to  float  over 
White  House  and  Capitol,  or  even  to  lead  the  march. 
And  we  can  all  agree  with  him  "  that  person  is  at 
least  as  sacred  as  its  incident,  property."  The  only 
question  about  either  is  to  what  extent  protection  is 
the  business  of  Congress. 


CHAPTER   XIII. 

MARSHAL     AND     RECORDER. 

No  politician,  who  aimed  at  keeping  the  colored 
people  subservient  to  his  ambition,  would  venture  to 
show  as  much  dissatisfaction  with  their  religious 
views,  as  was  expressed  at  this  time  by  Douglass.  It 
is  impossible  to  realize  how  independently  he  has 
thought,  and  how  disinterestedly  he  has  spoken,  un 
less  this  point  is  made  duly  prominent.  Before  look 
ing  at  him  as  a  holder  of  office,  we  must  know  how 
high  he  stands  above  such  a  readiness  to  conform  to 
received  opinions,  as  has  always  been  the  shortest 
and  easiest  way  to  promotion  and  patronage. 

Sympathy  with  recent  movements  in  theology  has 
deepened  the  impression  made  by  what  he  calls  the 
"  pregnant  and  striking  fact  that  American  slavery 
never  was  afraid  of  American  religion."  We  have 
seen  how  he  treated  some  well-known  texts  at  Nash 
ville  ;  and  in  a  lecture  on  "  William  the  Silent,"  writ 
ten  near  the  close  of  the  war,  he  said  :  "  For  what 
ever  else  we  may  be  indebted  to  religion,  we  owe  it 
nothing  for  the  idea  of  religious  toleration.  Nothing 
is  so  imperious,  exacting,  unreasoning,  and  intolerant 
as  faith,  when  it  takes  full  possession  of  the  human 
mind."  His  speaking  of  the  passage  of  the  Fifteenth 
Amendment,  as  due  to  "  our  common  humanity," 
333 


334  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

rather  than  to  divine  grace,  called  out  so  much 
censure  that  he  wrote  in  a  letter  to  the  "  Washington 
Republican,"  in  June,  1870  : 

"  If  the  instigator  of  this  sham  trial,  in  place  of  getting  up 
these  church  meetings  to  try  distant  heretics  like  myself,  would 
honestly  go  to  work,  and  endeavor  to  reform  the  character,  man 
ners,  and  habits  of  the  infestering  thousands  of  colored  people, 
who  live  in  the  utmost  misery  and  destitution  in  the  immediate 
vicinity  of  Big  Bethel,  he  would  do  more  to  prove  his  church 
sound  than  hy  passing  any  number  of  wordy  resolutions  about 
thanking  God." 

Early  in  1874  he  took  part  in  dedicating  the  hall 
of  the  Free  Congregational  Society  in  Florence, 
Massachusetts,  and  spoke  very  plainly  about  the  faith 
in  which  he  had  lived  while  a  slave.  Soon  after,  he 
was  invited  to  speak  before  the  Free  Religious  Associ 
ation  in  Boston,  in  company  with  its  president,  Rev. 
O.  B.  Frothingham,  Mr.  F.  E.  Abbot,  of  the  "  Index," 
Colonel  Higginson,  Dr.  Bartol,  and  Rabbi  Sonne- 
schein.  His  letter,  which  was  published  in  company 
with  one  from  the  founder  of  the  Brahmo  Somaj,  is 
as  follows  : 

"WASHINGTON,  D.  C.,  May  15,  1874. 
"  Dear  Mr.  Potter  : — 

"  I  have  delayed  attention  to  your  kind  invitation  thus  long  in 
the  hope  of  being  able  at  last  to  return  you  an  affirmative 
answer,  but  circumstances  are  against  me.  I  cannot  be  present 
at  your  Free  Religious  Convention  in  Boston.  This  is,  of  course, 
of  smaller  consequence  to  others  than  to  myself,  for  I  should 
come  more  to  hear  than  be  heard.  Freedom  is  a  word  of 
charming  sound,  not  only  to  the  tasked  and  tortured  slaves  who 
toil  for  an  earthly  master,  but  for  those  who  would  break  the 
galling  chains  of  darkness  and  superstition.  Regarding  the 


MARSHAL    AND    RECORDER.  335 

Free  Religious  movement  as  one  for  light,  love,  and  liberty, 
limited  only  by  reason  and  human  welfare,  and  opposed  to  the 
works  of  those  who  convert  life  and  death  into  enemies  of  human 
happiness,  who  people  the  invisible  world  with  ghastly  task 
masters,  I  give  it  hearty  welcome.  Only  the  truth  can  make 
men  free,  and  I  trust  that  your  convention  will  be  guided  in  all 
its  utterances  by  its  light  and  feel  its  power.  I  know  many  of 
the  good  men  and  women  who  are  likely  to  assemble  with  you, 
and  I  would  gladly  share  with  them  the  burden  of  reproach 
which  their  attacks  upon  popular  error  will  be  sure  to  bring 
upon  them.  Very  truly  yours, 

"  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS." 

His  letters  to  friends  furnish  these  passages  : 
"  I  once  had  a  large  stock  of  hope  on  hand,  but  like  the  sand 
in  the  glass,  it  has  about  run  out.  My  present  solace  is  in  the 
cultivation  of  religious  submission  to  the  inevitable,  in  teaching 
myself  that  I  am  but  a  breath  of  the  Infinite,  perhaps  not  so 
much.  I  was  very  sorry  not  to  be  able  to  attend  the  Free  Relig 
ious  Convention  in  Boston  last  week.  I  shall  hereafter  try  to 
know  more  of  these  people."  ..."  I  sometimes  (at  long  inter 
vals)  try  my  old  violin ;  but  after  all,  the  music  of  the  past  and 
of  imagination  is  sweeter  than  any  my  unpracticed  and  unskilled 
bow  can  produce.  So  I  lay  my  dear,  old  fiddle  aside,  and  listen 
to  the  soft,  silent,  distant  music  of  other  days,  which,  in  the 
hush  of  my  spirit,  I  still  find  lingering  somewhere  in  the  mysteri 
ous  depths  of  my  soul." 

The  most  complete  utterance  of  his  views  is  a  lec 
ture  which  was  delivered  before  the  Bethel  Literary 
and  Historical  Society  in  Washington,  and  has  not 
been  published.  The  subject  is  the  saying,  incor 
rectly  credited  to  Galileo,  "  It  Moves."  Among  the 
opening  sentences  are  these  : 

"  I  do  not  know  that  I  am  an  evolutionist,  but  to  this  extent 
I  am  one.  I  certainly  have  more  patience  with  those  who  trace 


33  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

mankind  upward  from  a  low  condition,  even  from  the  lower 
animals,  than  with  those  who  start  him  at  a  high  point  of  per 
fection  and  conduct  him  to  a  level  with  the  brutes.  I  have  no 
sympathy  with  a  theory  that  starts  man  in  heaven,  and  stops 
him  in  hell."  ...  "An  irrepressible  conflict,  grander  than 
that  described  by  the  late  William  H.  Seward,  is  perpetually 
going  on.  Two  hostile  and  irreconcilable  tendencies,  broad  as 
the  world  of  man,  are  in  the  open  field  ;  good  and  evil,  truth 
and  error,  enlightenment  and  superstition." 

Another  passage  I   quote  at  some  length,  because 
it  is  decidedly  the  ablest  I  know  of  on  this  side. 

"  It  may  not  be  a  useless  speculation  to  inquire  whence  comes 
the  disposition  or  suggestion  of  reform,  whence  that  irresistible 
power  that  impels  men  to  brave  all  the  hardships  and  dangers 
involved  in  pioneering  an  unpopular  cause.  Has  it  a  natural  or 
a  celestial  origin  ?  Is  it  human,  or  is  it  divine,  or  is  it  both  ? 
I  have  no  hesitation  in  stating  where  I  stand  in  respect  of  these 
questions.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  true  philosophy  of  reform 
is  not  found  in  the  clouds,  in  the  stars,  nor  anywhere  else  out 
side  of  humanity  itself.  So  far  as  the  laws  of  the  universe  have 
been  discovered  and  understood,  they  seem  to  teach  that  the 
mission  of  man's  improvement  and  perfection  has  been  wholly 
committed  to  man  himself.  He  is  to  be  his  own  savior  or  his 
own  destroyer.  He  has  neither  angels  to  help  him,  nor  devils 
to  hinder  him.  It  does  not  appear  from  the  operation  of  these 
laws,  nor  from  any  trustworthy  data,  that  divine  power  is  ever 
exerted  to  remove  any  evil  from  the  world,  how  great  soever 
it  may  be.  Especially  does  it  never  appear  to  protect  the  weak 
against  the  strong,  the  simple  against  the  cunning,  the  oppressed 
against  the  oppressor,  the  slave  against  his  master,  the  subject 
against  his  king,  or  one  hostile  army  against  another,  although  it 
is  usual  to  pray  for  such  interference,  and  also  for  the  conquer 
ors  to  thank  God  for  the  victory,  though  such  thanksgiving 
assumes  that  the  Heavenly  Father  is  always  with  the  strong 
and  against  the  weak,  and  with  the  victors  against  the  van 
quished.  No  power  in  nature  asserts  itself  to  save  even  inno- 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  337 

cence  from  the  consequences  of  violated  law.  The  babe  and 
the  lunatic  perish  alike  when  they  throw  themselves  down,  or 
by  accident  fall,  from  a  sufficient  altitude  upon  sharp  and  flinty 
rocks  beneath,  for  this  is  the  fixed  and  unalterable  penalty  for 
the  transgression  of  the  law  of  gravitation.  The  law  in  all  di 
rections  is  imperative  and  inexorable,  but  beneficial  with  all. 
Though  it  accepts  no  excuses,  grants  no  prayers,  heeds  no 
tears,  but  visits  all  transgressors  with  cold  and  iron-hearted 
impartiality,  its  lessons,  on  this  very  account,  are  all  the  more 
easily  and  certainly  learned.  If  it  were  not  thus  fixed,  in 
flexible,  and  immutable,  it  would  always  be  a  trumpet  of  un 
certain  sound,  and  men  could  never  depend  upon  it,  nor  hope 
to  attain  complete  and  perfect  adjustment  to  its  requirements, 
because  what  might  be  in  harmony  with  it  at  one  time,  would 
be  discordant  with  it  at  another.  Or  if  it  could  be  propitiated 
by  prayers  or  other  religious  offerings,  the  ever  shifting  sands 
of  piety  or  impiety  would  take  the  place  of  law,  and  men 
would  be  destitute  of  any  standard  of  right,  any  test  of  obedi 
ence,  or  any  stability  of  moral  government. 

The  more  thoughtful  among  orthodox  believers  concede  that 
the  laws  appertaining  to  matter  are  unchangeable  and  eternal. 
They  have  ceased  to  pray  for  rain  or  for  clear  weather,  but  to 
save  something  from  the  wreck  which  this  admission  must  make 
in  their  theological  system,  they  except  the  spiritual  nature  of 
man  from  the  operation  of  fixed  and  unchangeable  law.  But, 
plainly  enough,  they  gain  nothing  by  this  distinction.  If  the 
smallest  particle  of  matter  in  any  part  of  the  universe  is  subject 
to  law,  it  seems  to  me  that  a  thing  so  important  as  the  moral 
nature  of  man  cannot  be  less  so.  It  may  be  further  objected 
to  the  orthodox  view  of  this  question,  that,  in  effect,  it  does 
away  with  moral  and  spiritual  law  altogether,  and  leaves  man 
without  any  rule  of  moral  and  spiritual  life.  For  where  there  is 
no  law,  there  can  be  no  transgression,  and  hence  no  penalty. 
This  is  not  the  only  difficulty  in  the  way  of  our  acceptance  of 
the  common  .theology,  and  where  it  manifestly  stands  in  con 
tradiction  to  sound  reason.  If  they  admit  that  there  are  moral 
laws,  but  affirm  that  the  consequences  of  their  violation  may  all 


33**  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

be  removed  by  a  prayer,  a  sigh,  or  a  tear,  the  result  is  about 
the  same  as  if  there  were  no  law.  Faith,  in  that  case,  takes  the 
place  of  law,  and  belief,  the  place  of  life.  A  man,  on  this  theory, 
has  only  to  believe  himself  pure  and  right,  a  subject  of  special 
divine  favor,  and  he  is  so.  Absurd  as  this  position  is  to  some 
of  us,  it  is,  in  some  vague  way,  held  by  the  whole  Christian 
world  about  us,  and  Christians  must  cling  to  it,  or  give  up  the 
entire  significance  of  their  prayers  and  worship.  I  discard 
this  office  of  faith  for  many  reasons.  It  seems  to  me  that  it 
strikes  at  the  fundamental  principle  of  all  real  progress,  and 
ought,  by  some  means  or  other,  to  be  removed  from  the  minds 
of  men.  I  think  it  will  be  found  that  all  genuine  reform  must 
rest  on  the  assumption  that  man  is  a  creature  of  absolute,  in 
flexible  law,  moral  and  spiritual ;  and  that  his  happiness  and 
well-being  can  only  be  secured  by  discovery  and  perfect  obe 
dience  to  such  laws." 

In  1875  he  protested  against  making  a  white  man, 
who  was  secretary  of  the  American  Missionary  Asso 
ciation,  president  of  Howard  University,  in  place  of 
some  black  man  who  would  keep  the  institution  un- 
sectarian  ;  and  five  years  later  he  spoke  thus  to  his 
own  people,  as  may  be  seen  from  the  last  page  of  his 
"  Life  and  Times  :  "  '*  My  hope  for  the  future  of  my 
race  is  further  supported  by  the  rapid  decline  of  an 
emotional,  shouting,  and  thoughtless  religion.  Scarcely 
in  any  direction  can  there  be  found  a  less  favorable 
field  for  mind  or  morals  than  where  such  a  religion 
prevails."  .  .  .  "Its  tendency  is  to  substitute 
faith  for  virtue,  and  is  a  deadly  enemy  to  our  prog 
ress."  He  spoke  at  the  May  meeting  of  the  F.  R. 
A.,  in  1883,  when  he  remarked  that  he  supposed  he 
had  been  invited  merely  to  give  a  color  to  the  occasion. 
In  "Harper's  Weekly,"  that  year,  for  December  8,  there 
is  an  article  in  which  he  speaks  of  "  The  Condition  of 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  339 

the  Freedmen,"  in  language  which  he  had  also  used 
in  a  speech  at  Topeka,  Kansas.  He  is  satisfied  of  the 
existence  of  "  a  visible  and  growing  improvement," 
both  as  to  honesty  and  chastity  ;  and  this  he  attrib 
utes  largely  to  the  fact  that  "  The  old,  emotional 
camp-meeting  religion  is  subsiding  among  them,  and 
thought  is  taking  the  place  of  feeling."  "These  old- 
fashioned  preachers,"  he  adds,  "  minister  to  passion, 
decry  the  intellect,  and  induce  contentment  in  ignor 
ance  and  stupidity,  and  hence  are  a  hinderance  to  prog 
ress."  The  young  people  who  have  learned  to  read 
and  write  have  no  further  use  for  "  the  old,  cast-off, 
theological  hats  and  coats  of  fifty  years  ago."  .  .  . 
"  It  is  evident  that  morals  and  manners  have  gained 
by  the  change,  and  will  continue  to  gain  as  the  lamp 
of  knowledge  grows  bright  among  them."  Busts  of 
Strauss  and  Feuerbach  ornament  his  study  ;  and 
when,  as  he  was  about  to  go  to  Hayti,  in  1889,  a 
handsome  Bible  was  presented  to  him  by  a  colored 
congregation  in  Washington,  he  took  care,  while  re 
ceiving  the  gift  with  the  utmost  cordiality,  not  to 
touch  on  topics  which  he  had  been  able  to  handle  in 
the  orthodox  way,  on  a  similar  occasion  forty-two 
years  before. 

Nothing  which  he  said  about  theology  or  politics 
seems  to  have  created  so  much  excitement  in  Wash 
ington,  as  a  lecture  delivered  there  in  1875,  an(^  en* 
titled  "  Our  National  Capital."  He  begins  by  refer 
ring  to  the  ill  success  of  his  "William  the  Silent,"  as 
a  reason  for  speaking  of  what  he  knows  from  obser 
vation.  Then  come  amusing  pictures  of  the  native- 
born  Washingtonian  gentleman,  the  local  white 
trash,  the  spoilsmen  from  abroad,  and  the  member  of 


34-O  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Congress,  who  "  has  two  cats  in  his  room  and  only 
one  mouse  in  his  closet,  who  gives  a  constituent  a 
letter  of  recommendation  for  a  position,  and  then  runs 
ahead  of  him  by  another  street  to  say  that  what  he 
has  written  was  only  for  buncombe  and  should  re 
ceive  no  attention."  He  himself  has  been  "  usually 
approached  by  the  dark  side  of  our  fellow-citizens," 
or  else  by  white  men  who  tell  wonderful  things  about 
what  they  or  their  fathers  did  when  it  cost  something 
to  be  known  as  an  Abolitionist.  "  Through  this  class 
I  have  learned  that  there  were  a  great  many  more 
underground-railroad  stations  at  the  North,  than  I 
ever  dreamed  of  in  the  time  of  slavery,  and  when  I 
sorely  needed  one  myself."  "  Every  man  in  Wash 
ington,"  he  says,  "  is  assigned  to  one  of  two  classes: 
the  class  which  is  used  by  everybody,  or  the  class 
that  uses  everybody."  He  also  complains  of  the  lack 
of  business  energy,  which  has  made  this  perhaps  the 
only  city  in  the  United  States,  where  land  has  been 
worth  no  more  for  fronting  on  a  navigable  river.  But 
his  severest  censures  fall  upon  the  cruelty  with 
which  horses  and  mules  are  treated  by  negro  drivers 
without  rebuke.  He  concludes  by  acknowledging 
that,  besides  improving  in  many  other  ways,  "Wash 
ington,  from  being  one  of  the  most  oppressive  and 
illiberal  cities  of  the  Union  toward  the  colored  race, 
has  now  become  one  of  the  most  enlightened  and 
liberal." 

Nothing  in  this  lecture  prevented  the  people  of  the 
District  from  coming  by  the  thousand  to  hear  the 
oration  which  he  delivered,  in  the  presence  of  the 
President,  the  Cabinet,  Judges  of  the  Supreme  Court, 
Senators  and  Representatives,  at  Washington,  on  April 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  341 

14,  1876,  at  the  unveiling  of  the  freedmen's  statue  of 
Lincoln.  This  has  been  called  his  ablest  work.  It 
is  printed  in  full  in  the  appendix  to  "  Life  and  Times," 
as  well  as  in  a  separate  pamphlet,  and  is  more  remark 
able  for  uniform  elevation  of  view  and  impartiality 
of  judgment,  than  for  exceptionally  brilliant  passages. 
According  to  the  system  of  rewarding  fidelity  to 
party  with  appointment  to  office,  his  claim  was  strong; 
and  a  letter  of  April  2,  1873,  mentions  the  possibility, 
but  remarks  that,  "  The  honor  would  be  the  main 
consideration  in  any  case,  for  it  is  not  likely  that  any 
salary  would  be  paid  me  as  far  above  my  expenses 
as  I  can  make  my  income  by  lecturing."  Hayes  had 
scarcely  been  counted  in  and  inaugurated,  when  he 
withdrew  the  federal  troops  from  South  Carolina  and 
Louisiana.  Public  opinion  has  sanctioned  this  meas 
ure;  but  there  was  danger  that  the  colored  people 
might  think  their  interests  overlooked  ;  and  their  fore 
most  representative  was  accordingly  given  the  hon 
orable  and  lucrative  office  of  marshal  of  the  District. 
The  "  Nation  "  speaks  of  the  appointment  as  "  pictur 
esque  but  not  reformatory."  The  local  lawyers  tried 
to  have  it  rejected  by  the  Senate  ;  but  a  confirmation 
was  promptly  secured  by  Conkling,  on  March  18.  The 
opposition  revived  a  month  or  two  later,  when  the 
marshal  ventured,  while  complying  with  an  invitation 
to  be  present  at  the  opening  of  the  international 
exhibition,  which  followed  the  Centennial  one  in 
Philadelphia,  to  deliver  the  lecture  on  Washington  in 
Douglass  Hall,  Baltimore.  The  news,  that  they  had 
been  made  fun  of  before  a  negro  audience  in  Balti 
more,  was  too  much  for  the  Washingtonians.  Their 
papers  were  in  "  a  tempest  of  passion,"  as  may  be 


342  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

seen  from  the  letter,  in  justification  of  the  lecture,  in 
the  Autobiography  (pp.  469-71).  Very  few  of  either 
the  white  or  the  colored  people  of  the  District  dared 
to  say  a  word  for  the  lecturer  ;  his  bondsmen  were 
urgently  solicited  to  withdraw  their  names,  and  thus 
disqualify  him  ;  President  Hayes  received  petition 
after  petition  for  removal ;  but  the  Marshal  retained 
his  place. 

He  was  not  allowed  to  introduce  guests  at  the 
White  House  on  state  occasions,  which  had  been  done 
by  his  predecessors  under  Grant  and  Lincoln  ;  and 
he  was  urged  by  some  colored  friends  to  resign  on 
this  account  ;  but  he  refused  to  do  so.  He  has,  I 
think,  fully  justified  himself  by  urging  that  the  priv 
ilege  was  no  part  of  the  functions  and  duties  con 
ferred  upon  him  by  law,  but  merely  a  usage  of  so 
recent  origin,  that  a  President  might  alter  it  without 
giving  offense  ;  and  he  does  not  consider  that  he  was 
personally  slighted  by  Mr.  or  Mrs.  Hayes. 

He  had  found  himself  on  his  appointment  "  in  a  per 
fect  snow-storm  of  letters  of  congratulation."  Then 
came  a  swarm  of  applicants  for  office  ;  and  a  son  of 
his  old  master  was  among  the  seekers  for  a  place 
under  him.  He  writes  that,  "  I  have  more  than  fifty 
cats  for  one  mouse,  and  I  am  tired  of  saying  '  no.' ' 
One  of  his  deputies,  Colonel  Perry  H.  Carson,  tells 
me  that  he  worked  like  a  tiger,  and  was  on  the  spot 
early  and  late.  He  kept  the  office  long  enough  to  be 
present  at  Garfield's  inauguration  ;  but  not  long 
enough  to  have  Guiteau  in  custody  ;  and  he  did  not 
take  part  in  putting  any  one  to  death. 

Early  in  1878  he  was  invited  by  a  colored  friend  to 
revisit  St.  Michael's,  where  he  had  been  a  slave.  His 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  343 

old  master,  Thomas  Auld,  was  then  very  sick,  but 
sent  a  messenger  for  him.  As  he  came  to  the 
bedside  and  was  addressed  as  "  Marshal  Douglass," 
he  replied,  "  not  Marshal,  but  Frederick  to  you  as 
formerly."  They  shook  hands  ;  the  sick  man  burst 
into  tears  ;  and  both  were  for  a  while  speechless. 
Then  it  was  that  Douglass  asked  what  he  now  thought 
of  his  slave's  running  away.  After  a  moment's  hesita 
tion,  the  answer  came,  "  Frederick,  I  always  knew 
you  were  too  smart  to  be  a  slave,  and  in  your  place 
I  should  have  done  as  you  did."  "Captain  Auld," 
was  the  reply,  "  I  am  glad  to  hear  you  say  this.  I  did 
not  run  away  from  you,  but  from  slavery."  He  also 
admitted,  as  already  mentioned,  that  he  had  been 
mistaken  in  one  of  the  charges  made  in  his  first  book  ; 
but  not  that  he  had  done  him  injustice  knowingly. 

This  visit  to  St.  Michael's  took  place  shortly  before 
Decoration  Day,  1878,  when  he  spoke  from  the  Stal 
wart  standpoint  in  Union  Square,  New  York  City, 
and  did  not  forget  to  refer  to  "  the  old  Bay  State,  the 
heart  and  brain  of  New  England,  the  home  of  Sum- 
ner,  Andrew,  and  Wilson."  Passages  have  been 
already  quoted  from  his  addresses  at  a  meeting  held  in 
Washington,  on  June  3,  1879,  in  memory  of  William 
Lloyd  Garrison.  During  that  same  month  the  people 
of  Rochester  placed  a  marble  bust  of  "  her  most  dis 
tinguished  citizen,"  in  the  hall  of  her  University. 

A  serious  difference  in  opinion  among  leading 
colored  men  was  brought  about  by  a  general  emigra 
tion  of  their  people  in  Mississippi,  Louisiana,  and 
other  States,  Northward  and  Westward.  The  fact 
that  this  exodus  began  in  February,  1879,  when  there 
was  peculiarly  little  excitement  about  politics,  shows 


344  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

that  the  chief  cause  was  not  Democratic  intimidation, 
but  financial  distress.  The  freedman  found,  after 
settling  accounts  with  planters  and  store-  keepers  at 
the  end  of  the  year,  that  he  was  not  getting  fair  pay 
for  his  work.  The  emigrants  testified,  to  quote  the 
words  of  Marshal  Douglass,  that  : 

"  Work  as  hard,  faithfully,  and  constantly  as  they  may,  live  as 
plainly  and  as  sparingly  as  they  may,  they  are  no  better  off  at 
the  end  of  the  year  than  at  the  beginning.  They  say  that  they 
are  the  dupes  and  victims  of  cunning  and  fraud  in  signing  con 
tracts  which  they  cannot  read  and  cannot  fully  understand ;  that 
they  are  compelled  to  trade  at  stores  owned  in  whole  or  in  part 
by  their  employers ;  and  that  they  are  paid  with  orders  and  not 
with  money.  They  say  that  they  have  to  pay  double  the  value 
of  nearly  everything  they  buy  ;  that  they  are  compelled  to  pay  a 
rental  of  ten  dollars  a  year  for  an  acre  of  ground  that  will  not 
bring  thirty  dollars  under  the  hammer ;  that  land-owners  are  in 
league  to  prevent  land-owning  by  negroes  ;  that  when  they  work 
the  land  on  shares  they  barely  make  a  living ;  that  outside  the 
towns  and  cities  no  provision  is  made  for  education,  and,  ground 
down  as  they  are,  they  cannot  themselves  employ  teachers  to 
instruct  their  children." 

How  much  poverty  had  to  do  with  this  emigration 
is  plain  from  such  facts  as  that  thousands  landed  from 
steamers  at  St.  Louis  without  any  money  for  going 
further,  and  that  two-thirds  of  the  sixty  thousand, 
who  reached  Kansas  during  twelve  months,  were  piti 
ably  destitute,  and  had  to  have  an  association  organ 
ized  for  their  relief.  There  were  comparatively  few 
of  these  refugees  at  Washington  ;  but  their  condition 
was  so  deplorable,  that  Douglass  lost  no  time  in 
appealing  to  his  friends  for  money.  Among  those 
who  responded  liberally  was  Mrs.  Elizabeth  Thomp 
son,  who  has  presented  our  nation  with  Carpenter's 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  345 

picture  of  the  "  Signing  of  the  Emancipation  Procla 
mation,"  and  expended  large  sums  for  many  other 
worthy  objects. 

The  same  spirit  of  philanthropy,  which  made 
Marshal  Douglass  quick  to  relieve  the  sufferings  of 
the  emigrants,  made  him  slow  to  recommend  those 
who  remained  behind  to  follow  them.  Other  colored 
orators  expatiated  on  the  advantages  of  just  laws,  im 
partial  tribunals,  free  suffrage,  high  wages,  and  ad 
vanced  civilization  at  the  North.  How  he  replied  in 
half  a  dozen  speeches,  may  be  seen  from  the  paper 
which  was  read  at  Saratoga,  on  September  12,  1879, 
before  the  American  Social  Science  Association.  It 
is  reprinted  fully  in  their  journal,  for  May,  1880,  and 
with  some  omissions  in  his  "  Life  and  Times."  He 
begins  by  stating  the  great  fact  that,  "  The  prosperity 
and  civilization  of  the  South  are  at  the  mercy  of  the 
hated  and  despised  negro."  He  is  so  perfectly  adapted 
to  the  climate  that  "  For  him,  as  a  Southern 
laborer,  there  is  no  competitor  or  substitute."  Social 
prejudices,  as  well  as  climate,  keep  whites  from  work 
ing  in  the  South  ;  and  the  black  man  must  always  be 
"  the  arbiter  of  her  destiny."  He  has  begun  to  emi 
grate  under  circumstances  described  in  a  passage 
already  quoted  in  part.  But,  when  his  friends  at  the 
North  are  called  upon  to  contribute  funds  for  increas 
ing  the  number  of  emigrants  : 

"  It  may  well  enough  be  said  that  the  negro  question  is  not 
so  desperate  as  the  advocates  of  this  exodus  would  have  the 
public  believe;  that  there  is  still -.hope  that  the  negro  will  ulti 
mately  have  his  rights  as  a  man,  and  be  fully  protected  in  the 
South  ;  that  in  several  of  the  old  slave  States  his  citizenship  and 
his  right  to  vote  are  already  respected  and  protected ;  that  the 


346  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

same,  in  time,  will  be  secured  for  the  negro  in  other  States." 
.  .  .  "  The  Fourteenth  Amendment  makes  him  a  citizen, 
and  the  Fifteenth  makes  him  a  voter.  With  power  behind  him 
at  work  for  him,  and  which  cannot  be  taken  from  him,  the  negro 
of  the  South  may  wisely  bide  his  time." 

It  is  unfortunate  for  the  colored  people  of  the  South 
to  have  the  North  begged  to  give  money  to  help  them 
emigrate  ;  for  this  encourages  the  belief  that  they  are 
not  able  to  take  care  of  themselves.  It  involves  a 
surrender  of  their  right  to  be  protected  where  they 
are  ;  it  encourages  a  restlessness  which  would  keep 
them  poor  ;  and  it  tempts  them  into  regions  where 
they  would  have  to  compete  with  laborers  much 
better  adapted  to  the  climate  as  well  as  to  the  state 
of  society.  It  is  also  to  be  remembered  that  "  In  the 
South  the  negro  has  at  least  the  possibility  of  power  ; 
in  the  North  he  has  no  such  possibility." 

"  As  an  assertion  of  power  by  a  people  hitherto  held  in  bitter 
contempt ;  as  an  emphatic  and  stinging  protest  against  high 
handed,  greedy,  and  shameless  injustice  to  the  weak  and  de 
fenseless  ;  as  a  means  of  opening  the  blind  eyes  of  oppressors 
to  their  folly  and  peril,  the  exodus  has  done  valuable  service. 
Whether  it  has  accomplished  all  of  which  it  is  capable  in  this 
particular  direction  for  the  present,  is  a  question  which  may  well 
be  considered.  With  a  moderate  degree  of  intelligent  leader 
ship  among  the  laboring  class  at  the  South,  properly  handling 
the  justice  of  their  cause,  and  wisely  using  the  exodus  example, 
they  can  easily  exact  better  terms  for  their  labor  than  ever 
before.  Exodus  is  medicine,  not  food ;  it  is  for  disease,  not 
health ;  it  is  not  to  be  taken  from  choice,  but  necessity.  In 
anything  like  a  normal  condition  of  things,  the  South  is  the  best 
place  for  the  negro.  Nowhere  else  is  there  for  him  a  promise 
of  a  happier  future.  Let  him  stay  there  if  he  can,  and  save  both 
the  South  and  himself  to  civilization.  While,  however,  it  may 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  347 

be  the  highest  wisdom  under  the  circumstances  for  the  freedmen 
to  stay  where  they  are,  no  encouragement  should  be  given  to 
any  measures  of  coercion  to  keep  them  there.  The  American 
people  are  bound,  if  they  are  or  can  be  bound  to  anything,  to 
keep  the  north  gate  of  the  South  open  to  black  and  white,  and 
to  all  the  people.  The  time  to  assert  a  right,  Webster  says,  is 
when  it  is  called  in  question.  If  it  is  attempted  by  force  or  fraud 
to  compel  the  colored  people  to  stay,  then  they  should  by  all 
means  go  ;  go  quickly,  and  die,  if  need  be,  in  the  attempt.  Thus 
far  and  to  this  extent  any  man  may  be  an  emigrationist,  and  thus 
far  and  to  this  extent  I  certainly  am  an  emigrationist.  In  no 
case  must  the  negro  be  "  bottled  up  "  or  "  caged  up."  He  must 
be  left  free,  like  every  other  American  citizen,  to  choose  his  own 
local  habitation,  and  to  go  where  he  shall  like.  Though  it  may 
not  be  for  his  interest  to  leave  the  South,  his  right  and  power  to 
leave  it  may  be  his  best  means  of  making  it  possible  for  him  to 
stay  there  in  peace.  Woe  to  the  oppressed  and  destitute  of  all 
countries  and  races,  if  the  rich  and  powerful  are  to  decide  when 
and  where  they  shall  go  or  stay." 

This  address  was  read  at  Saratoga,  but  not  by  its 
author,  who  thus  lost  the  opportunity  to  defend 
himself  against  some  criticisms  which  were  made  by 
Professor  Greener,  upon  the  views,  as  he  says,  of  ''  the 
greatest  negro  whom  America  has  ever  produced." 

The  members  of  the  Association  agreed,  for  the 
most  part,  with  the  essayist.  The  exodus  did  not  last 
long  ;.  and  whatever  attempts  are  made  to  renew  it 
will  be  regulated  by  due  attention  to  considerations 
which  have  been  summed  up  thus  by  Douglass.  "  A 
negro  in  a  snow-bank  makes  a  ridiculous  picture  ; 
the  colors  don't  blend." 

His  efforts  in  the  interest  of  all  classes  at  the  South 
were  badly  repaid  by  fire  on  October  14,  1879,  when 
the  barn  on  the  estate  to  which  he  had  just  removed, 


348  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

on  a  hill  over-looking  Washington,  was  burned  by 
some  white  trash,  jealous  of  negro  superiority.  He 
felt  for  some  time  too  insecure  to  sleep  at  night  ;  but 
he  held  his  ground,  and  has  long  since  ceased  to  be 
molested. 

He  was  still  popular  enough  among  his  own  people 
to  be  chosen  president  of  their  convention  at  Louis 
ville,  in  July,  1880,  and  he  was  prominent  in  that 
year's  campaign,  although  his  health  had  been  bad 
ever  since  his  return  from  San  Domingo  in  1871. 
On  August  4,  1880,  he  made  an  effective  speech  at 
Rochester  for  Garfield  against  Hancock,  who  had, 
he  said,  promised  more  than  he  could  perform,  in 
pledging  himself  to  execute  the  great  amendments. 
"  He  has  stolen  our  thunder,  but  will  find  it  too 
heavy  for  him."  The  best  thing  in  this  speech  is  the 
hint  to  the  colored  people  that,  "  With  money  and 
property  comes  knowledge  and  power  ;  what  we  call 
money  is  only  stored  labor  ;  a  poverty  stricken  class 
will  be  an  ignorant  and  despised  class  ;  and  no 
amount  of  sentiment  can  make  it  otherwise."  He 
had  given  the  same  advice,  three  days  before  in  that 
city,  to  a  great  concourse  of  his  own  people,  met  on 
what  he  rightly  calls  "  the  colored  man's  day,"  to 
remember  gratefully  how  Great  Britain  became,  "  the 
mother  of  our  abolition  movement."  This  speech  is, 
in  great  part,  given  at  the  end  of  "  Life  and  Times," 
and  the  extract  closes  with  his  "  hopes  that  that  bet 
ter  day  for  which  the  more  thoughtful  amongst  us 
have  long  labored,  and  the  millions  of  our  people 
have  sighed  for  centuries,  is  near  at  hand." 

He  made  a  visit  the  next  winter  to  Florida  ;  and 
there  was  such  a  rush  of  even  the  poorest  members  of 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  349 

his  race  to  see  him  that  a  hotel-keeper  at  Jackson 
ville  asked  him  to  use  his  influence  to  keep  them  out 
of  the  parlor.  "No,"  was  the  reply;  "wherever  I 
am,  they  can  come."  On  February  23,  1881,  he  was 
back  in  Washington,  delivering  a  magnificent  eulo- 
gium  on  the  star-spangled  banner,  as  he  presented  the 
flag  given  to  the  Roscoe  Conkling  Club  of  Boys  in 
Blue  by  the  Senator  whose  name  they  bore. 

The  "  North  American  Review,"  for  April,  i88i,has 
an  article  on  "  The  Color-line,"  by  Marshal  Doug 
lass,  who  appeals,  not  only  to  his  own  experience  in 
Europe,  but  to  that  of  Remond,  Ward,  Garnett,  Bruce, 
and  others,  in  proof  of  the  fact  that  there  is  "  no 
color-prejudice  in  Europe,  except  among  the  Ameri 
cans  who  reside  there."  He  saw  none  of  it  in  our 
own  great  men,  like  Lincoln,  Seward,  Chase,  Hale, 
Wilson,  and  Sumner  ;  its  existence  in  this  country 
may  be  fully  accounted  for  by  the  previous  enslave 
ment  of  the  negro  ;  and  the  hatred  against  him  is  so 
much  like  that  against  the  Jews  in  Berlin,  Irishmen 
in  London,  Christians  in  Constantinople,  and  China 
men  in  San  Francisco,  or  like  the  intolerance  once 
felt  by  Catholics  against  Protestants,  that  "  We  may 
well  enough  affirm  that  this  prejudice  really  has 
nothing  whatever  to  do  with  race  or  color."  "The 
color  is  innocent  enough,"  he  adds,  "but  things 
coupled  with  it  make  it  hated.  Slavery,  ignorance, 
stupidity,  servility,  poverty,  dependence,  are  undesir 
able  conditions.  When  these  cease  to  be  coupled 
with  color,  there  will  be  no  color-line  drawn."  .  .  . 
"Prejudice  of  race  and  color  is  only  natural  in  the 
sense  that  ignorance,  superstition,  bigotry,  and  vice 
are  natural."  .  "It  has  no  better  defense  than 


35°  FREDERICK   DOUGLASS. 

they,  and  should  be  despised  and  put  away  from 
human  relations  as  an  enemy  to  the  peace,  good 
order,  and  happiness  of  human  society." 

His  term  as  marshal  expired  in  1881,  and  in  May 
of  that  year  he  was  appointed  to  a  lucrative  office, 
exacting  but  little  personal  labor,  that  of  Recorder 
of  Deeds  for  the  District  of  Columbia.  On  decora 
tion  day  soon  after,  he  delivered  an  address  on  John 
Brown,  at  Harper's  Ferry  before  the  members  of  the 
colored  college  in  that  town.  On  the  platform  sat 
the  attorney  who  led  the  prosecution.  "  What  an 
overturning,  what  wonderful  progress,  that  I  should 
be  called  upon  to  deliver  such  an  address  at  Harper's 
Ferry,"  says  an  unpublished  letter.  On  June  12,  he 
revisited  the  Lloyd  plantation  in  a  revenue  cutter, 
as  is  related  very  touchingly  in  the  "  Life  and  Times  " 
(pp.  492-500)  ;  and  in  November  he  spoke  at  Easton, 
the  county  seat  where  he  had  been  imprisoned  in 
1836,  when  he  was  led  into  town,  with  his  hands  tied, 
by  the  mounted  constable  who  had  arrested  him  for 
trying  to  run  away.  He  presided  on  September  26, 
1881,  at  a  meeting  of  colored  people  held  in  Wash 
ington  in  honor  of  the  President  who  was  buried 
that  day  while  the  nation  mourned.  In  his  brief 
speech  he  mentioned  as  an  instance  of  the  greatness 
of  the  loss  to  his  race,  the  fact  that  the  assassination 
had  prevented  the  fulfilment  of  a  plan  for  "  sending 
some  colored  representatives  abroad  to  other  than 
colored  nations."  He  had  himself  been  invited  to 
take  an  important  position  of  this  kind,  but  had  pre 
ferred  to  remain  at  home. 

In  January,  1882,  the  Park  Publishing  Company, 
of  Hartford,  issued  the  "  Life  and  Times  of  Frederick 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  351 

Douglass,"  written  by  himself,  with  an  introduction 
by  Judge  Ruffin,  of  Boston.  It  contains  a  fine  por 
trait,  but  the  other  illustrations  are  of  little  value. 
This  book  does  not  give  so  full  an  account  of  his 
life  before  1843  as  "  My  Bondage  and  My  Freedom," 
but  it  is  our  chief  authority  for  subsequent  years.  It 
is  very  interesting  throughout  and  contains  several 
recent  speeches ;  but  the  arrangement  is  not  sys 
tematic. 

In  this  year,  on  August  4,  he  lost  his  wife,  and  wrote 
to  one  of  his  friends,  "  The  main  pillar  of  my  house 
has  fallen." 

We  have  seen  him  working  with  Father  Mathew  ; 
but  he  said  this  year  at  Providence,  "  While  as  a  tem 
perance  man,  I  should  be  glad  to  see  every  grogshop 
in  the  land  abolished,  I  am  not  inclined  to  adopt  the 
prohibition  doctrine."  Of  one  of  the  leading  organi 
zations  which  support  it,  he  said,  on  September  i, 
1884:  "Though,  as  I  think,  it  is  manifestly  wrong 
and  abundant  in  mischief,  its  members  are  among 
the  most  conscientious  and  philanthropic  of  the 
American  people."  As  he  was  going  to  one  of  the 
many  places  where  he  has  been  received  with  public 
honors,  a  colored  man,  who  talked  as  fast  as  Dickens's 
Mr.  Jingle,  forced  himself  into  his  company  and  went 
with  him  to  the  house  where  he  was  to  be  the  guest 
of  a  graduate  of  Oberlin.  This  must,  he  thought,  be 
one  of  the  committee  ;  but  they  supposed  him  to  be 
some  personal  friend  of  their  visitor.  While  the  lat 
ter  was  brushing  his  hair,  the  Oberlin  man  came  in 
with  a  bottle,  saying  :  "  I  know  nothing  about  brandy 
myself,  but  your  friend  says  this  is  excellent."  "  Now, 
what  do  you  suppose  I  want  of  brandy  ?  I  never  use 


352  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

it."     "  Why,  your  friend  said  you  always  did  when  you 
had  been  travelling."     Exit  Jingle. 

The  twentieth  anniversary  of  Lincoln's  proclama 
tion  was  celebrated  in  Washington,  on  January  i, 
1883,  by  a  banquet  given  to  Douglass  by  colored 
citizens  of  the  United  States.  His  speech  dwelt  on 
the  great  improvement  made  by  the  race  in  those 
twenty  years;  and  he  acknowledged  this  in  the 
address  which  he  made  on  the  twenty-  first  anniver 
sary  of  Emancipation  in  the  District,  April  16.  On 
the  latter  occasion,  he  also  declared  that  the  colored 
people  "  cannot  remain  half  slave  and  half  free." 
"  You  must  give  them  all,  or  take  from  them  all. 
Discussion  of  their  wrongs  must  go  on  until  the 
public  schools  shall  cease  to  be  caste  schools  ;"  .  .  . 
"  until  the  colored  man's  pathway  to  the  ballot-boxy 
North  and  South,  shall  be  as  smooth  and  as  safe  as 
the  same  is  for  the  white  citizen  ;"  .  .  .  "  until  the 
courts  of  the  country  shall  grant  the  colored  man  a 
fair  trial  and  a  just  verdict  ;"  .  .  .  "until  color  shall 
cease  to  be  a  bar  to  equal  participation  in  the  offices 
and  honors  of  the  country  ;"  .  .  .  "  until  the  trades- 
unions,  and  the  workshops  of  the  country  shall  cease 
to  proscribe  the  colored  man,  and  prevent  his  children 
from  learning  useful  trades  ;"  .  .  .  "  until  the  Ameri 
can  people  shall  make  character,  and  not  color,  the 
criterion  of  respectability."  In  closing  he  said  : 
"  There  is  but  one  destiny,  it  seems  to  me,  left  for  us, 
and  that  is  to  make  ourselves,  and  be  made  by  others, 
a  part  of  the  American  people,  in  every  sense  of  the 
word.  Assimilation,  and  not  isolation  is  our  true 
policy."  .  .  .  "  We  cannot  afford  to  set  up  for  our 
selves  a  separate  political  party,  or  adopt  for  our- 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  353 

selves  a  political  creed  apart  from  the  rest  of  our 
fellow-citizens.  Our  own  interests  will  be  subserved 
by  a  generous  care  for  the  interests  of  the  nation  at 
large.  All  the  political,  social,  and  literary  forces 
around  us  tend  to  unification." 

He  took  the  same  hopeful  tone  as  he  began  his 
address  on  September  24,  to  the  National  Convention 
of  Colored  Men,  at  Louisville,  where  he  presided  ; 
but  he  went  on  to  say  that  such  conventions  are 
needed,  because  the  colored  man  "  is  still  surrounded 
by  an  adverse  sentiment  which  fetters  all  his  move 
ments."  .  .  .  "  His  course  upward  is  resented  and  re 
sisted  at  every  step  of  his  progress."  .  .  .  "The color- 
line  meets  him  everywhere,  and,  in  a  measure,  shuts 
him  out  from  all  respectable  and  profitable  trades  and 
callings."  .  .  .  "He  is  rejected  by  trades-unions  of 
every  trade,  and  refused  work."  ..."  Not  even  our 
churches  have  yet  conquered  this  feeling  of  color- 
madness."  .  .  .  "  What  is  called  lynch-law  is  peculi 
arly  the  law  for  colored  people,  and  for  nobody 
else."  .  .  .  "Our  meeting  here  was  opposed  by  some 
of  our  members,  because  it  would  disturb  the  peace 
of  the  Republican  party."  .  .  .  "Depend  upon  it, 
men  will  not  care  much  for  a  people  who  do  not  care 
for  themselves."  He  then  went  on  to  recommend 
that  Congress  should  investigate  the  working  of  the 
shop-order  system,  should  aid  common  schools  and 
endow  colored  colleges,  should  reimburse  the  losers 
by  the  Freedman's  Bank,  should  do  full  justice  to 
colored  claiments  of  bounties  and  pensions,  should 
enforce  the  Civil  Rights  Bill,  and  should  protect 
colored  voters  at  the  polls.  He  added  that  in  making 
these  demands,  "We  leave  social  equality  where  it 


354  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

should  be,  with  each  individual  man  and  woman. 
No  law  can  regulate  it."  But  he  did  call  attention 
to  the  fact,  that  "  We  shall  never  cease  to  be  a  despised 
and  persecuted  class,  while  we  are  known  to  be  ex 
cluded  by  our  color  from  all  important  positions 
under  government."  In  conclusion  he  said  :  "We 
hold  it  to  be  self-evident  that  no  class  or  color  should 
be  the  exclusive  rulers  of  this  country.  If  there  is 
such  a  ruling  class,  there  must  of  necessity  be  a  sub 
ject  class,  and  when  this  condition  is  once  established, 
this  government  of  the  people,  by  the  people  and  for 
the  people,  will  have  perished  from  the  earth." 

Scarcely  had  this  address  been  delivered,  when  the 
Civil  Rights  Bill  was  pronounced  unconstitutional 
by  the  Supreme  Court,  on  the  ground  that  Congress 
had  no  power  to  forbid  discriminations,  in  public 
conveyances,  inns,  or  theatres,  on  account  of  color, 
unless  made  in  consequence  of  State  legislation.  Such 
legislation  may  be  counteracted  by  Congress  ;  but 
where  the  laws  are  just  it  must  be  left  to  each  State 
to  carry  them  out,  unless  rebellion  justifies  federal 
interference.  Douglass  left  points  of  law  to  be  dis 
cussed  by  his  friend,  Colonel  Ingersoll,  and  pleaded 
against  the  injustice  of  denouncing  the  measure  as  a 
"  Social  Rights  Bill."  .  .  . 

"  To  say  that  because  a  man  rides  in  the  same  car  with  an 
other,  he  is  therefore  socially  equal,  is  one  of  the  wildest  ab 
surdities."  ..."  Social  equality  is  a  matter  between  individ 
uals.  It  is  a  reciprocal  understanding.  I  don't  think,  when  I 
ride  with  an  educated,  polished  rascal,  that  he  is  thereby  made 
my  equal."  ..."  If  it  is  a  bill  for  social  equality,  so  is  the 
Declaration  of  Independence;  "  .  .  .  "so  is  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount;  so  is  the  Golden  Rule  ;  "  .  .  .  "  so  is  the  Constitution  of 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  355 

the  United  States  ;  and  so  are  the  laws  and  customs  of  every 
civilized  country  in  the  world ;  for  nowhere,  outside  of  the 
United  States,  is  any  man  denied  civil  rights  on  account  of  his 
color." 

His  marriage  with  Miss  Helen  Pitts,  early  in  1884, 
has  done  much  to  make  his  later  years  bright  and 
happy.  It  was  in  her  company  that  he  attended  the 
funeral  of  Wendell  Phillips,  on  Wednesday  forenoon, 
February  6,  in  the  Hollis  Street  Church,  where  Miss 
Louisa  Alcott  sat  between  them  ;  and  that  afternoon 
he  saw  the  eloquent  champion  of  all  the  oppressed 
lie  in  state,  guarded  by  colored  soldiers,  in  Faneuil 
Hall.  He  had  made  a  special  journey  in  order  to 
take  part  in  paying  these  last  honors  ;  and  whatever 
differences  in  opinion  had  existed  between  them  were 
entirely  forgotten  as  he  poured  out  his  gratitude,  in 
behalf  of  his  race  as  well  as  of  himself,  in  the  address 
which  was  delivered  soon  after  at  Washington,  and 
has  been  printed  in  the  "  Life  and  Times  of  Wendell 
Phillips,"  by  George  Lowell  Austin,  1884.  He  has 
not  lost  sight  of  either  the  merits  or  the  defects  of 
Garrison.  Never,  from  first  to  last,  did  he  speak  of 
Phillips  except  in  a  love  too  deep  and  warm  to  make 
criticism  possible. 

During  the  political  campaign  of  1884,  the  Jerry 
Rescue  celebration  was  revived  at  Syracuse,  in  order 
to  give  a  good  opportunity  for  a  Elaine  speech  by 
Douglass.  The  defeat  of  his  party  that  year  was 
afterward  attributed  by  him  to  the  fact,  that,  "  It 
made  national  help  more  important  and  prominent 
than  national  purity  ;"  "appealed  to  the  pocket  and 
not  to  the  heart  of  the  nation,"  and  was  "loud  for  the 
protection  of  things,  but  silent  for  the  protection  of 


356  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

men."  While  speaking  thus,  on  April  16,  1885,  the 
anniversary  of  Emancipation  in  the  District,  he 
said:  "The  inaugural  address  of  President  Cleveland 
was  all  that  any  friend  of  liberty  and  justice  could 
reasonably  ask  for  the  freedmen."  ...  "  No  better 
words  have  dropped  from  the  east  portico  of  the 
Capitol,  since  the  inauguration '  days  of  Abraham 
Lincoln  and  General  Grant."  Whether  the  party  was 
as  good  as  the  President  was  another  question  ;  but 
"  Let  it  do  justice  to  the  negro,  and  it  will  certainly 
succeed  itself  in  power  four  years  hence  and  long 
years  after."  He  added,  however,  that  the  Repub 
lican  party  was  still  that  of  the  colored  man  ;  and 
that  their  right  to  the  franchise  would  be  the  chief 
issue  in  the  campaign  of  1888,  unless  full  justice  was 
done  them  previously.  He  spoke  as  a  leader  of  his 
people  at  the  dedication,  in  February,  1886,  of  a  mem 
orial  to  General  Hunter,  who  had  been  one  of  the 
first  to  give  them  a  place  among  our  nation's  defend 
ers.  The  short  article  which  he  contributed  to  the 
"  North  American  Review  "  for  April  in  that  year,  on 
"  The  Future  of  the  Colored  Race,"  is  delightfully 
hopeful  and  confident. 

What  his  own  relations  were  with  Mr.  Cleveland,  is 
shown  by  a  letter  important  enough  to  be  given  in 
full  : 

"  WASHINGTON,  D.  C,  April  6,  1886. 
"  HON.  F.  W.  BIRD. 

"  My  Dear  Sir : — I  am  obliged  by  your  note  of  yesterday, 
requesting  me  to  state  the  facts  connected  with  my  removal 
from  the  office  of  Recorder  of  Deeds  for  the  District  of  Columbia. 
I  assure  you  that  there  was  nothing  summary  or  unpleasant  about 
it.  I  am  a  Republican,  and  did  all  I  could  to  defeat  the  election  of 


MARSHAL  AND  RECORDER.  357 

Mr.  Cleveland.  He  was  under  no  political  obligation  to  me 
whatever ;  yet  I  held  the  office  of  Recorder  nearly  a  whole  year 
under  his  Administration,  an  office  by  law  held  not  for  any  term 
but  solely  at  the  pleasure  of  the  President.  He  could  have 
removed  me  at  his  pleasure  at  any  time  after  his  inauguration. 
When  he  asked  for  my  resignation,  he  simply  asked  me  to 
set  a  time  when  it  would  be  agreeable  to  me  to  tender  it.  I  did 
set  the  time,  and  when  that  time  arrived  I  sent  in  my  resigna 
tion.  His  manner  toward  me  wTas  in  every  way  courteous,  and 
I  have  nothing  whatever  to  complain  of.  While  in  office, 
President  Cleveland  treated  me  as  he  treated  other  office-hold 
ers  in  the  District.  He  was  brave  enough  to  invite  Mrs. 
Douglass  and  myself  to  all  his  grand  receptions,  thus  rebuking 
the  timidity — I  need  not  say  cowardice  or  prejudice — of  his  pre 
decessor.  I  am  a  Republican,  and  if  living  shall  do  all  I  can 
to  elect  a  Republican  in  1888  ;  but  I  know  manliness  wherever 
I  find  it ;  and  I  have  found  it  in  President  Cleveland,  and  I 
should  despise  myself  if  I  should  let  any  one  think  otherwise. 
Whatever  else  he  may  be,  he  is  not  a  snob ;  and  he  is  not  a 
coward.  Yours  very  truly, 

"  FRED'K  DOUGLASS." 


CHAPTER    XIV. 
THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM. 

RELEASE  from  the  cares  of  office  enabled  Douglass 
to  give  his  thoughts  more  fully  than  had  recently 
been  possible  to  such  questions  as,  how  his  brethren 
are  prospering  at  the  South  ;  what  they  have  a  right 
to  ask  from  the  national  Government  for  their  more 
complete  protection  and  education  ;  which  party  is 
doing  them  the  best  service  ;  and  what  steps  ought  to 
be  taken  for  their  relief  by  individuals  outside  of 
politics. 

In  the  address  which  he  made  on  April  16,  1886,  in 
memory  of  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of 
Columbia,  he  mentioned  the  significant  fact  that  the 
occasion  was  celebrated  for  the  first  time  by  the  col 
ored  people  in  two  rival  gatherings.  His  own  hope 
that  negroes  would  be  better  treated  after  they  had 
ceased  to  help  the  Republican  party  rule  at  the 
South,  had  been  sadly  disappointed.  "Their  condi 
tion  seems  no  better  and  not  much  worse  than  under 
previous  administrations.  Lynch  law,  violence,  and 
murder  have  gone  on  about  the  same  as  formerly,  and 
without  the  least  show  of  federal  interference  or 
popular  rebuke."  ..."  There  have  also  been 
the  usual  number  of  outrages  committed  against  the 
civil  rights  of  colored  citizens  on  highways  and  by- 
358 


THE    NATION  S    PROBLEM.  359 

ways,  by  land  and  by  water  ;  and  the  courts  of  the 
country,  under  the  decision  of  the  Supreme  Court  of 
the  United  States,  have  shown  the  same  disposition 
to  punish  the  innocent  and  shield  the  guilty,  as  dur 
ing  the  presidency  of  Mr.  Arthur."  .  .  .  "The 
truth  is  that  neither  the  Republican  party  nor  the 
Democratic  party  has  yet  complied  with  the  solemn 
oath  taken  by  their  respective  representatives  to  sup 
port  the  Constitution  and  execute  the  laws  enacted 
under  its  provisions."  ..."  Has  any  of  our  Re 
publican  presidents  since  Grant  earnestly  endeavored 
to  establish  justice  in  the  South  ?" 

Referring  to  the  charge  that  "  Negroes  are  by  na 
ture  the  criminal  class  of  America,"  he  said  : 

"  I  admit  the  charge,  but  deny  that  nature,  race,  or  color  has 
anything  to  do  with  the  fact.  Any  other  race,  with  the  same 
antecedents  and  the  same  conditions,  would  show  a  similar 
thieving  propensity.  The  American  people  have  this  lesson  to 
learn,  that  where  justice  is  denied,  where  poverty  is  enforced, 
where  ignorance  prevails,  and  where  any  one  class  is  made  to 
feel  that  society  is  an  organized  conspiracy  to  oppress,  rob,  and 
degrade  them,  neither  persons  nor  property  would  be  safe." 
.  .  .  "  While  I  hold  now,  as  I  held  years  ago,  that  the  South 
is  the  natural  home  of  the  colored  race,  and  that  there  must  the 
destiny  of  that  race  be  mainly  worked  out,  I  still  believe  that 
means  can  be  and  ought  to  be  adopted,  to  assist  in  the  emigra 
tion  of  such  of  their  number  as  may  wish  to  change  their  resi 
dence  to  parts  of  the  country,  where  their  civil  and  political 
rights  are  better  protected  than  at  present  they  can  be  at  the 
South." 

He  had  no  sympathy  with  those  colored  men  who 
wished  to  take  an  independent  position  in  politics. 
"The  Republican  party  is  not  perfect  ;  it  is  cautious 


360  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

even  to  the  point  of  timidity  ;  but  it  is  the  best  friend 
we  have." 

He  took  the  same  ground  on  revisiting  Boston, 
where,  on  Saturday,  May  22,  two  days  after  deliver 
ing  the  John  Brown  lecture  in  the  Music  Hall,  he  was 
the  guest  of  those  leading  Republicans  who  compose 
the  Massachusetts  Club.  The  dinner  was  at  Young's 
Hotel,  and  he  said  : 

"  I  have  so  seldom  dined  in  my  life,  that  I  am  at  a  loss  to 
know  how  to  make  an  after-dinner  speech.  I  have  heard  say 
that  such  speeches  should  be  witty ;  and  I  am  no  wit.  I  have 
heard  say  that  they  should  be  short.  I  never  made  a  short 
speech  in  my  life  with  which  I  \vas  satisfied  ;  and  I  don't  know 
that  I  ever  made  a  long  speech  with  which  anybody  else  was 
satisfied." 

After  expressing  his  wonder  at  finding  himself  in 
such  company,  and  hearing  no  one  say  "  Douglass, 
get  out,"  he  continued  thus  : 

"  I  am  sometimes  asked  '  How  are  your  people  getting  along 
at  the  South  ?'  I  am  at  a  loss  sometimes  to  know  to  whom  they 
refer.  Who  are  my  people  at  the  South  ?  I  am  in  a  position 
to  speak  more  impartially,  perhaps,  than  any  man  in  this  room 
as  regards  the  merits  of  the  two  races,  for  I  occupy  a  middle 
position."  .  .  .  "It  would  be  as  appropriate  to  ask,  '  How 
are  the  white  people  of  the  South  getting  along  ?  '  as  to  ask  how 
the  colored  people  are  getting  along.  The  two  should  go  to 
gether  :  one  cannot  get  along  without  the  other."  ..."  Men 
ask  me  if  I  don't  think  that  the  condition  of  the  freedmen  is 
hopeless.  I  tell  them  '  Never  ! '  I  have  seen  too  much  progress." 

After  referring  to  what  had  been  suffered  by  his 
people  and  also  by  himself,  he  said,  "  Now,  I  look 
around  in  vain  for  anybody  to  insult  me."  He  was, 
however,  very  desirous  that  much  more  stress  should 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  361 

be  laid,  in  the  campaign  of  1888,  on  the  duty  of  the 
nation  toward  the  freedman,  than  was  actually  the 
case.  He  deeply  regretted  the  decision  against  the 
constitutionality  of  the  Civil  Rights  Bill,  and  said  : 
"  I  am  one  of  those  who  pray  to  my  God  every  day 
for  a  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  that  shall 
be  as  true  to  liberty  as  ever  Judge  Taney  was  to 
slavery." 

On  Monday  evening,  May  24,  he  spoke  at  the 
Woman  Suffrage  meeting  in  Tremont  Temple,  and 
began  with  the  words,  "  It  is  a  long  time  since  it  was 
my  privilege  to  address  a  convention  of  reformers  in 
Boston."  After  referring  to  the  opposition,  which 
had  been  made  to  the  speaking  of  women  in  public, 
he  said  : 

"  In  bearing  this  cross,  and  maintaining  this  conflict,  woman 
has  risen  in  grandeur  and  glory,  like  the  rainbow  above  the 
storm.  In  securing  the  right  to  think  and  speak,  the  right  to 
use  her  voice  and  her  pen,  she  has  secured  the  means  of  victory 
in  all  other  right  directions ;  for  speech  is  the  lever  that  moves 
the  world."  He  rejoiced  in  her  attainment  of  a  higher  educa 
tion  and  larger  opportunities  for  supporting  herself;  and  he 
held  that  "  There  is  not  one  reason,  not  one  consideration  of  jus 
tice  and  expediency,  upon  which  man  can  claim  the  right  to 
vote,  which  does  not  equally  apply  to  woman."  ...  "If  the 
law  takes  no  thought  of  sex  when  it  accuses  her  of  crime,  why 
should  it  take  thought  of  sex  when  it  bestows  its  privileges  ?  " 
...  "If  man  could  represent  woman,  it  follows  that  woman 
could  represent  man,  but  no  opponent  of  woman  suffrage  would 
admit  that  woman  could  represent  him  in  the  government." 
...  "  Believing,  as  I  firmly  do  believe,  that  human  nature  as 
a  whole,  contains  more  good  than  evil,  I  am  willing  to  trust  the 
whole,  rather  than  a  part,  in  the  conduct  of  human  affairs." 
...  "  What  could  be  more  absurd  upon  the  face  of  it,  than  to 


362  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

pretend  that  to  put  woman  on  a  plane  of  political  equality  with 
man,  is  to  degrade  her,  when  the  whole  argument  for  making 
man  the  exclusive  possessor  of  the  ballot  is  based  upon  his 
superiority  to  woman  ?  Does  the  possession  of  the  suffrage 
degrade  man  ?  If  not,  it  will  not  degrade  woman."  He  also 
remarked  that  if  those  people,  who  say  women  do  not  wish  to 
vote,  really  felt  sure  of  it,  they  would  not  take  so  much  pains 
to  prevent  them  from  having  the  opportunity;  and  he  also 
showed  that  two  other  objections,  namely,  that  wives  would 
quarrel  with  their  husbands  about  politics,  and  that  wives 
would  merely  follow  their  husbands,  really  answer  each  other. 
In  conclusion,  he  urged  that  the  suffrage  would  be  "  a  vast 
advantage  to  woman  herself.  Her  dignity  and  importance,  as 
a  member  of  society,  would  be  greatly  augmented.  She  would 
be  brought  into  responsible  and  honorable  relations  with  the 
government ;  her  citizenship  would  be  full  and  complete ;  and 
instead  of  being  merely  a  subject,  she  would  be  a  sovereign. 
And  now  I  ask,  what  right  have  I,  what  right  have  you,  what 
right  has  anybody  who  believes  in  government  of  the  people, 
by  the  people  and  for  the  people,  to  deny  to  woman  this  full 
and  complete  citizenship  ?  What  right  have  I,  what  right  have 
you,  what  right  has  anybody  thus  to  humiliate  one-half  of  the 
human  family  ?  " 

Douglass  now  made  up  his  mind  to  carry  out  pur 
poses  formed  long  ago,  and  visit  not  only  France  and 
Italy,  but  Egypt.  Shortly  before  he  left,  he  came  to 
Boston  as  the  guest  of  the  Wendell  Phillips  Club, 
who  gave  him  a  dinner  at  the  Revere  House  on  Sat 
urday  evening,  September  n,  1886.  Among. the  other 
guests  were  those  veteran  Abolitionists,  Dr.  Bowditch, 
Oliver  Johnson,  and  James  M.  Buffum  ;  and  there, 
too,  was  the  Democratic  Mayor  of  Boston,  in  company 
with  Judge  Ruffin,  Lewis  Hayden,  and  other  leading 
colored  men.  The  chief  guest  opened  his  speech 
thus  : 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  363 

"  If  I  have  done  anything  for  the  colored  people,  it  is  in  a 
great  measure  due  to  my  having  had  the  good-fortune,  when  I 
escaped  from  slavery,  to  become  acquainted  with  William  Lloyd 
Garrison,  and  with  Wendell  Phillips,  and  with  our  friend  Oliver 
Johnson,  and  with  Dr.  Bowditch.  The  home  of  Dr.  Bowrditch, 
I  may  say,  gave  me  the  first  shelter  I  received  in  this  city.  I 
have  often  been  asked  where  I  got  my  education.  I  have  an 
swered,  frpm  the  Massachusetts  Abolition  University,  Mr.  Gar 
rison,  president." 

He  went  on  to  say  : 

"  I  have  been  grieved  at  one  thing,  and  I  think  we  should  set 
our  faces  against  it.  We  are  imitating  the  extravagancies  of 
the  white  people  among  whom  we  are :  and  it  is  going  on  at  a 
fearful  rate.  I  meet  with  colored  men  on  all  sides  smoking, 
and  sometimes  drinking.  That  is  not  the  way  to  rise  in  the 
world.  For  my  own  part,  I  neither  smoke,  nor  chew  tobacco, 
nor  take  snuff,  nor  drink  whiskey ;  and  I  should  be  delighted  if 
I  could  make  the  same  statement  with  regard  to  my  whole 
people." 

In  conclusion,  he  said  : 

"  I  shall  take  this  demonstration  of  your  club  with  me  abroad, 
and  if  I  have  occasion  to  speak  in  England,  (I  am  not  going  as 
an  advocate,)  I  shall  remember  your  injunction  to  extend  your 
sympathy  to  all  men  oppressed ;  and  I  shall  not  hesitate  to  de 
clare  my  own  entire  sympathy  with  that  grand  old  man,  Mr. 
Gladstone,  in  his  endeavors  to  remove  the  reproach  of  oppres 
sion  from  England  and  to  extend  the  desired  liberty  to  Ireland." 

"  My  year's  trip  abroad,"  as  he  calls  it  in  an  unpub 
lished  lecture,  led  him,  after  looking  once  more  at 
the  Tower  of  London  and  Westminster  Abbey,  to 
France,  where  impatience  at  the  way  his  baggage 
was  treated  "  made  me  for  the  momenta  free-trader." 
He  spent  two  months  in  Paris,  "  a  city  of  taste  and 


364  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

terrors,  of  heroes  and  horrors,  of  beauty,  barricades, 
and  bottles."  He  was  shocked  at  the  non-observance 
of  Sunday  ;  but  he  never  met  a  single  drunken  or 
disorderly  person  on  that  day,  which  fact  he  attributes 
to  the  national  character.  No  building  impressed 
him  so  deeply  as  the  church  whose  bell  was  the  signal 
for  the  massacre  of  Saint  Bartholomew  ;  and  nothing 
gave  him  such  pleasure  as  that  utter  absence  of  color- 
prejudice,  which  had  surprised  Dr.  Bowditch  more 
than  fifty  years  ago.  This  Douglass  says  is  "  in 
part,  because  the  negro  has  never  been  seen  there  as 
a  degraded  slave,  but  often  as  a  gentleman  and  a 
scholar."  He  visited  the  grave  of  "  a  man  whose 
great  heart  was  broad  enough  to  take  in  the  whole 
world,  and  who,  in  my  estimation  ranks  among  the 
greatest  of  the  human  race,"  Victor  Hugo.  He  praises 
the  fine  appearance  of  the  law-makers,  as  well  as  the 
courtesy  with  which  the  members  of  that  Senate  treat 
each  other.  He  was  also  pleased  to  see  the  horses 
driven  without  check-rein  or  blinders.  He  often 
heard  Father  Hyacinthe,  and  "  was  deeply  impressed 
by  his  character  and  preaching,"  although  he  could 
not  "understand  all  his  words." 

He  was  much  struck  by  the  relics,  at  Avignon,  of 
the  time  when  "  Religion  stood  no  such  nonsense  as 
what  we  call  free  thought."  .  .  .  "A  difference  of 
religion,  in  the  days  of  this  old  palace,  was  sufficient 
to  justify  the  utmost  cruelty  ;  and  difference  of  color 
to-day,  in  some  quarters,  is  about  the  same  thing. 
But  light  has  dawned  upon  the  papal  palace  of  Avig 
non."  ..."  It  is  no  longer  the  home  of  saints,  but 
the  home  of  soldiers."  .  .  .  "Martial  law  has  taken 
the  place  of  ecclesiastical  law  ;  and  there  is  no  doubt 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  365 

as  to  which  is  the  more  merciful  of  the  two."  So,  on 
reaching  Rome,  he  found  it  "neither  pleasant  to  the 
eye  nor  to  the  thought,"  to  meet  "the  vacant,  bare 
legged,  grimy  monks,  who  have  taken  avow  neither 
to  work  nor  to  wash  ;"  and  he  was  much  more  inter 
ested  in  the  ruins  of  the  past  than  in  the  ecclesiastical 
splendors  of  the  present.  Not  one  of  the  beautiful 
objects  in  Genoa  held  him  so  long  as  an  old  violin, 
that  with  which  Paganini  had  played  on  the  hearts  of 
thousands  as  never  man  had  played  before.  It  was 
precious  to  Douglass,  because  it  had  been  "  the 
favorite  instrument  of  the  most  famous  musical  genius 
of  his  time,"  and,  "  though  silent  and  motionless  now, 
could  once,  under  the  wonderful  touch  and  skill  of 
its  master,  fill  the  largest  halls  of  Europe  with  a  con 
cord  of  sweet  sounds,  and  cause  even  the  dull  hearts 
of  courts,  kings,  and  princes,  to  own  their  kinship 
to  common  mortals." 

Egypt  was  a  disappointment  in  some  respects. 
He  had  to  admit  that  her  temples  and  pyramids  were 
not  built  by  negro  kings  ;  and  it  took  him  two  weeks 
to  recover  from  the  terrible  strain  of  climbing  to  the 
great  pyramid's  top.  The  grandeur  of  the  prospect 
went  far  to  repay  him,  however ;  especially  the  view 
over  "  the  silent,  solemn,  measureless  desert."  He 
had  already  felt,  in  travelling  along  the  Suez  canal, 
usuch  a  deep  sense  of  unearthly  silence,  such  a  sense 
of  vast,  profound,  unbroken  sameness  and  solitude," 
as  enabled  him  to  understand  how  it  was  that  Moses 
and  the  prophets,  John,  the  Baptist,  Paul,  and  Mahom 
et  thought  God  peculiarly  near  them  in  the  desert, 
and  became  founders  of  new  religions. 

He  also  visited  Athens,  and  had  pleasant  meetings 


366  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

with  his  old  friends  in  England  and  their  children, 
before  returning  to  Washington,  where  we  find  him 
on  February  12,  1888,  the  seventy-ninth  anniversary 
of  the  birth  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  telling  how  "  he 
went  up  before  his  Maker  with  four  millions  of  broken 
fetters  in  his  arms."  Of  himself,  he  spoke  thus: 

"  I  came  down  here  from  the  North ;  I  was  not  born  in  the 
North  ;  but  I  went  North  on  a  mission  some  fifty  years  ago.  It 
was  not  healthy  for  me  to  come  down  here  for  some  twenty-five 
years  after  I  went  North."  In  going  on  to  describe  his  first 
interview  with  Lincoln  he  said  :  "  I  was  a  little  disturbed,  and 
a  great  deal  agitated  ;  but  there  was  no  real  cause  for  trepida 
tion  or  for  alarm.  I  was  going  to  see  a  great  man."  .  .  . 
"  I  have  noticed  that  the  higher  we  go  up,  in  the  gradations  of 
humanity  and  moral  greatness,  the  further  we  get  from  prej 
udices." 

Soon  afterward,  on  Saturday,  March  31,  he  spoke 
before  the  International  Council  of  Women,  who  had 
set  that  day  apart  in  order  to  hear  from  the  pioneers 
in  their  cause.  A  portion  of  this  speech  has  been  al 
ready  quoted.  Other  passages  run  thus  : 

"  One  year  ago  I  stood  on  the  Pincio  in  Rome,  and  witnessed 
the  unveiling  of  the  statue  of  Galileo.  It  was  an  imposing  sight. 
At  no  time  before  had  Rome  been  free  enough  to  permit  such 
a  statue  to  be  placed  within  her  walls.  It  is  now  there,  not 
with  the  approval  of  the  Vatican.  No  priest  took  part  in  the 
ceremonies.  It  was  all  the  work  of  laymen.  One  or  two  priests 
passed  the  statue  with  averted  eyes,  but  the  great  truths  of  the 
solar  system  were  not  angry  at  the  sight,  and  the  same  will  be 
true  when  woman  shall  be  clothed,  as  she  will  yet  be,  with  all 
the  rights  of  American  citizenship."  ..."  Whatever  the 
future  may  have  in  store  for  us,  one  thing  is  certain — this  new 
revolution  in  human  thought  will  never  go  backward.  When  a 
great  truth  once  gets  abroad  in  the  world,  no  power  on  earth 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  367 

can  imprison  it,  or  prescribe  its  limits,  or  suppress  it.  It  is 
bound  to  go  on  till  it  becomes  the  thought  of  the  world.  Such 
a  truth  is  woman's  right  to  equal  liberty  with  man.  She  was 
born  with  it.  It  was  hers  before  she  comprehended  it.  It  is 
inscribed  upon  all  the  powers  and  faculties  of  her  soul,  and  no 
custom,  law,  or  usage  can  ever  destroy  it.  Now  that  it  has  got 
fairly  fixed  in  the  minds  of  the  few,  it  is  bound  to  become  fixed 
in  the  minds  of  the  many,  and  be  supported  at  last  by  a  great 
cloud  of  witnesses,  which  no  man  can  number  and  no  power 
can  withstand." 

On  Monday  evening,  May  28,  he  spoke  before  the 
New  England  Woman  Suffrage  Association,  in  Tre- 
mont  Temple,  Boston,  where  he  argued  that  the 
question,  why  woman  is  forbidden  to  vote,  is  not  an 
swered  by  pleading  that  the  suffrage  is  not  a  right 
but  a  privilege.  In  conclusion,  he  said  that  "  If  the 
whole  is  greater  than  a  part,  if  the  sense  and  sum  of 
human  goodness  in  man  and  woman  combined  is 
greater  than  that  of  either  alone  and  separate,  then 
the  government  that  excludes  women  from  all  par 
ticipation  in  its  creation,  administration,  and  perpetu-* 
ation  maims  itself."  His  zeal  in  this  cause  has  not 
carried  him  so  far  as  to  approve  of  the  formation  of 
separate  suffrage  associations  by  colored  women. 
He  holds  that  real  reforms  must  keep  themselves 
above  the  color-line. 

Earlier  in  1888,  he  had  made  a  journey  through 
the  South,  and  had  been  escorted  into  Charleston  by 
a  company  of  soldiers  whose  name  was  brighter  than 
their  complexion,  the  Douglass  Light  Infantry. 
Soon  after  returning,  he  wrote  to  one  of  the  leaders 
in  a  movement  for  encouraging  emigration  of  colored 
people  to  the  North-west,  a  letter  which  is  dated 
April  10,  and  runs  thus  : 


368  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

"  I  have  long  hesitated  to  give  my  endorsement  to  any  move 
ment  looking  to  the  removal  of  considerable  numbers  of  the 
colored  people  of  the  South,  to  the  North  and  West.  I  have 
felt  that  it  was  better  that  they  should  endure,  and  patiently 
wait  for  better  conditions  of  existence  where  they  are,  than  to 
take  the  chance  of  seeking  them  in  the  cold  North,  or  in  Africa, 
or  elsewhere.  I  had  hoped  that  the  relations  subsisting  be 
tween  the  former  slaves  and  the  old  master  class  would  gradu 
ally  improve  ;  but  while  I  believed  this,  and  still  have  some  such 
weak  faith,  I  have  of  late  seen  enough,  heard  enough,  and 
learned  enough  of  the  condition  of  these  people  in  South  Caro 
lina  and  Georgia,  to  make  me  welcome  any  movement  which 
will  take  them  out  of  the  wretched  condition  in  which  I  now 
know  them  to  be.  While  I  shall  continue  to  labor  for  increased 
justice  to  those  who  stay  in  the  South,  I  give  you  my  hearty 
'  God-speed '  in  your  emigration  scheme.  I  believe  you  are 
doing  a  good  work." 

Ten  days  later,  at  the  emancipation  celebration  in 
Washington,  he  spoke  thus,  in  answer  to  the  charge 
that  the  negro  is  a  failure  as  a  citizen  and  is  in  every 
way  doing  badly  : 

"  I  admit  that  the  negro,  and  especially  the  plantation  negro, 
the  tiller  of  the  soil,  has  made  little  progress  from  the  barba 
rism  of  slavery  to  the  civilization  of  freedom  ;  that  he  is  in  a 
deplorable  condition  since  his  emancipation  ;  and  that  he  is 
physically  worse  off  in  many  respects  as  a  freeman  than  he  was 
when  a  slave .  But  I  contend  that  the  fault  was  not  his,  but  the 
fault  is  with  his  heartless  accusers.  The  explanation  is  easily 
given ;  he  is  the  victim  of  a  cunningly  devised  swindle — one 
which  paralyzes  his  energies,  suppresses  his  ambition,  blasts  his 
hope,  and  leaves  him  crushed  and  helpless.  In  fact,  though  he 
is  nominally  free,  he  is  still  actually  a  slave.  I  here  and  now 
denounce  his  so-called  emancipation  as  practically  a  stupen 
dous  fraud ; — a  fraud  upon  him,  a  fraud  upon  the  country,  a 
fraud  upon  the  world,  and  a  reproach  upon  the  American 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  369 

people.  It  was  not  so  meant  by  the  great-hearted  Abraham 
Lincoln.  It  was  not  so  meant  by  the  Republican  party;  but 
whether  so  meant  or  not,  I  contend  that  this  so-called  emanci 
pation  is  practically  a  lie  of  the  worst  kind,  keeping  the  word  of 
promise  to  the  ear  and  breaking  it  to  the  heart.  Do  you  ask  a 
more  particular  answer  to  the  question,  why  the  negro  of  the 
plantation  has  made  so  little  progress,  why  his  cupboard 
is  empty,  why  he  flutters  in  rags,  why  his  children  run  naked, 
and  his  wife  is  barefooted  and  hides  herself  behind  the  hut 
when  a  stranger  is  passing  ?  I  will  tell  you.  It  is  because  the 
husband  and  father  is  systematically  and  almost  universally 
cheated  out  of  his  hard  earnings.  The  same  class  that  once 
extorted  his  labor  under  the  lash,  now  extorts  his  labor  by  a 
mean,  sneaking,  and  fraudulent  device,  which  is  more  effective 
than  the  lash.  That  device  is  the  trucking  system,  a  system 
which  never  permits  him  to  see  or  save  a  dollar  of  his  hard 
earnings.  He  struggles  from  year  to  year,  but  like  a  man  in  a 
morass,  the  more  he  struggles,  the  deeper  he  sinks.  The 
highest  wages  paid  him  are  eight  dollars  a  month,  and  this  he 
receives  only  in  orders  on  a  store,  which,  in  many  cases,  is 
owned  by  his  employer.  This  scrip  has  a  purchasing  power  on 
that  one  store,  and  that  one  store  only.  A  blind  man  can  see  that 
by  this  arrangement  the  laborer  is  bound  hand  and  foot,  and  is 
completely  in  the  power  of  his  employer.  He  can  charge  the 
poor  fellow  just  what  he  pleases  and  give  him  what  kind  of 
goods  he  pleases,  and  he  does  both.  His  victim  cannot  go  to 
another  store  and  buy,  and  this  the  storekeeper  knows.  The 
only  security  the  wretched  negro  has  under  this  arrangement  is 
the  conscience  of  the  storekeeper — a  conscience  educated  in  the 
school  of  slavery,  where  the  idea  prevailed  in  theory  and  prac 
tice  that  the  negro  had  no  rights  which  white  men  were  bound 
to  respect,  an  arrangement  in  which  everything  in  the  way  of 
food  or  clothing,  whether  tainted  meat  or  damaged  cloth,  is 
deemed  good  enough  for  the  negro.  For  these  he  is  often  made 
to  pay  a  double  price.  But  this  is  not  all,  or  the  worst  result  of 
the  system.  It  puts  it  out  of  the  power  of  the  negro  to  save 
anything  of  what  he  earns.  If  a  man  gets  an  honest  dollar  for 


370  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

his  day's  work,  he  has  a  motive  for  laying  it  by  and  saving  it  for 
future  emergency.  It  will  be  as  good  for  use  in  the  future,  and 
perhaps  better  a  year  hence  than  now ;  but  this  miserable  scrip 
has  in  no  sense  the  quality  of  a  dollar.  It  is  only  good  at  one 
store  and  for  a  limited  period.  Thus  the  man  who  has  it  is 
tempted  to  get  rid  of  it  as  soon  as  possible.  It  may  be  out  of 
date  before  he  knows  it,  or  the  storekeeper  may  move  away  and 
it  may  be  left  worthless  on  his  hands."  ..."  In  England,  to 
her  credit  let  it  be  spoken,  this  trucking  system  is  abolished  by 
law.  It  is  a  penal  offense  there ;  and  it  should  be  here.  It 
should  be  made  a  crime  to  pay  any  man  for  his  honest  labor  in 
any  other  than  lawful  money." 

Copious  quotations  are  then  given  from  the  tenant 
laws  of  the  South  ;  and  the  orator  proceeds  thus  : 

"  Now  let  us  sum  up  some  of  the  points  in  the  situation  of  the 
freedman.  You  will  have  seen  how  he  is  paid  for  his  labor — 
how  a  full-grown  man  gets  only  eight  dollars  a  month,  out  of 
which  he  must  feed,  clothe,  and  educate  his  children.  You  have 
seen  how  even  this  sum  is  reduced  by  means  of  an  infamous 
truck  system  of  payment.  You  have  seen  how  easily  he  may  be 
charged  with  a  price  one-third  higher  than  the  value  of  the 
gqods  that  he  buys.  You  have  seen  how  easily  he  may  be 
compelled  to  receive  the  poorest  and  most  worthless  commodi 
ties  at  the  highest  prices.  You  have  seen  how  he  is  never 
allowed  to  see,  save,  or  handle  a  dollar.  You  have  seen  how 
impossible  for  him  to  accumulate  money  or  property.  You  have 
seen  how  completely  he  is  chained  to  the  locality  in  which  he 
lives.  You  have  seen,  therefore,  that  having  no  money,  he  can 
not  travel  or  go  anywhere  to  better  his  condition.  You  have 
seen  by  these  laws  that,  even  on  the  premises  which  he  rents, 
he  can  own  nothing,  possess  nothing,  but  what  must  belong  to 
the  landlord.  You  have  seen  that  he  cannot  sell  a  sheep,  a  pig, 
a  goat,  or  even  a  chicken,  without  the  consent  of  the  landlord, 
whose  claim  to  all  he  has  is  superior  and  paramount  to  all  other 
claims  whatsoever.  You  have  seen  that  he  works  for  the  land- 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  371 

lord  rather  than  for  himself.  You  have  seen  all  this  and  more  ; 
and  I  ask  again,  in  view  of  it  all,  how  in  the  name  of  human 
reason  could  the  negro  be  expected  to  make  progress,  or  rise 
higher  in  the  scale  of  morals,  manners,  religion,  and  civilization 
than  he  has  done  during  the  twenty  years  of  his  so-called  free 
dom  ?  Shame  !  Eternal  shame  on  those  writers  and  speakers 
who  taunt,  denounce,  and  disparage  the  negro,  because  he  is  to 
day  found  in  poverty,  rags,  and  wretchedness  !  " 

It  is  further  complained  that  our  National  Govern 
ment  allows  him  to  be  disfranchised,  while  "  His 
color  exposes  him  to  be  treated  as  a  criminal  ;"  and 
that  by  this  neglect,  as  well  as  by  the  decision  of 
1883,  he  is  "swindled  of  his  citizenship."  The 
best  remedy  would  have  been  to  make  Logan  or 
Conkling  President ;  but,  as  neither  was  living,  and 
there  was  no  probability  of  the  nomination  of  Judge 
Harlan,  the  only  member  of  the  Supreme  Court  who 
thought  the  Civil  Rights  Bill  constitutional,  the  pref 
erence  of  Douglass  in  April,  1888,  was  for  Senator 
Sherman. 

He  was  present  at  the  convention  which  nominated 
Harrison  and  Morton,  that  June  :  and  soon  after  he 
made  an  address  to  his  brethren,  in  which  he  remon 
strated  earnestly  against  joining  the  newly-organized 
"colored  Democratic  party."  The  leaders  in  that 
movement  asserted  that  "  The  Republican  party  has 
failed  to  protect  negro  suffrage  at  the  South  ;  "  and 
Douglass  replied  that  : 

"  It  is  not  true  that  the  Republican  party  has  not  endeavored 
to  protect  the  negro  in  his  right  to  vote.  The  whole  moral 
power  of  the  party  has  been,  from  first  to'  last,  on  the  side  of 
justice  to  the  negro;  and  it  has  only  been  baffled,  in  its  efforts 
to  protect  the  negro  in  his  vote,  by  the  Democratic  party." 


372  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Of  another  argument,  brought  up  by  the  black 
Democrats,  the  black  Republican  spoke  thus  : 

"  Suppose  it  be  granted  that  Mr.  Cleveland  is  a  just  man,  and 
desires  to  protect  colored  citizens  in  the  exercise  of  their  con 
stitutional  rights.  What  is  he,  and  what  is  any  man  in  the 
Presidential  chair,  without  the  support  of  his  party?  As 
against  his  party,  he  is  only  as  a  feather  against  a  whirlwind. 
In  the  hands  of  his  party,  Mr.  Cleveland  is  as  clay  in  the  hands 
of  the  potter." 

The  address  is  long  enough  to  occupy  about  ten 
pages  of  this  volume,  but  it  does  not  make  the  slight 
est  allusion  to  a  question  which,  as  Douglass  said  in 
another  of  his  campaign  speeches  "  has  been  the  lead 
ing  topic,  and  undoubtedly  will  continue  to  be  the 
leading  topic  of  this  canvass."  This,  of  course,  is  the 
tariff  ;  and  when  he  does  take  it  up,  he  makes  no  at 
tempt  to  prove  that  colored  people  have  any  large 
share  in  the  protected  industries.  He  does  maintain 
that  the  tariff  keeps  all  wages  up  ;  and  he  says  : 

"  Suppose  the  American  manufacturers  do  derive  larger  gains 
than  any  other  class,  suppose  protection  does  support  manufac 
turing  monopolies  in  America,  is  it  not  obvious  that  free  trade 
will  build  up  similar  monopolies  abroad  ?  "  ...  "  Let  the 
American  people  turn  their  attention  to  raising  cotton,  cattle, 
and  grain  for  Europe,  and  how  long  do  you  think  it  would  be 
before  the  manufacturers  of  Europe  would  put  up  the  prices  of 
all  their  articles?  " 

What  is  the  exclusive  topic  of  one  address  is,  how 
ever,  the  main  theme  of  the  other.  Both  insist  on  the 
duty  of  electing  a  Republican  President,  in  order  to 
restore  suffrage  to  the  freedman.  One  speech  dates 
his  disfranchisement  from  1877,  but  the  other  says  of 


THE    NATION  S    PROBLEM.  373 

Georgia  that  "  Under  the  shot-gun  rule,  the  Demo 
crats  carried  the  State  against  Grant  and  Colfax," 
who  were  candidates  in  1868.  Both  addresses  con 
sider  the  character  of  the  parties  more  important  than 
that  of  the  candidates  ;  but  it  is  said,  on  the  basis  of 
personal  knowledge  of  President  Harrison  : 

"  He  embodies  and  illustrates  the  highest  and  best  elements 
of  American  character."  ...  "  During  the  last  few  weeks, 
Mr.  Harrison  has  surprised  those  of  his  countrymen,  who  did 
not  as  I  did,  know  him,  by  the  fertility  of  his  mind,  the  breadth 
and  comprehensiveness  of  his  statesmanship.  His  more  than 
half  a  hundred  speeches  stand  like  a  wall  of  granite,  and  utterly 
defy  assault." 

Perhaps  the  most  important  contribution  made  by 
Douglass  to  this  campaign  was  a  letter,  written  in 
October,  to  oppose  one  of  the  best  nominations  made 
that  year  by  either  party  for  Congress,  that  of  Col 
onel  T.  W.  Higginson.  His  brilliant  services,  not 
only  as  a  speaker  but  as  a  soldier,  to  the  slave,  only 
brought  out  a  declaration  that  his  "  election,  consid 
ering  his  antecedents,  would  be  much  more  detri 
mental  to  our  cause  than  would  be  the  election  of  an 
old-time  pro-slavery  Democrat."  ...  "  Of  course,  if 
I  had  a  thousand  votes,  I  would  give  them  all  to 
General  Banks,  the  nominee  of  the  Republican  party." 

Before  writing  thus,  he  had  been  obliged,  by  pre 
vious  engagements,  to  decline  an  invitation  to  deliver 
an  oration  in  Faneuil  Hall,  on  November  13,  the  day 
when  the  monument  to  Crispus  Attuckswas  unveiled 
on  Boston  Common.  In  this  letter,  written  on  Octo 
ber  5,  1888,  he  says  he  is  "  happy  in  the  thought,  that 
the  Commonwealth  of  Massachusetts  is  about  to  com- 


374  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

memorate  an  act  of  heroism  in  a  race  seldom  credited 
with  heroic  qualities."  He  did  speak  at  the  celebra 
tion  in  Philadelphia,  on  December  6,  of  the  fifty-fifth 
anniversary  of  the  settlement  of  Rev.  Dr.  Furness  ;  he 
was  able  to  compare  his  recollections  with  Whittier's 
on  the  poet's  birthday,  December  17  ;  and  he  con 
tributed  to  the  "Cosmopolitan,"  for  August,  1889,  a 
paper  entitled  "  Reminiscences,"  and  forming  part  of 
a  series  about  "  The  Great  Agitation." 

The  last  speech  which  Douglass  has  published,  so 
far  as  I  know,  and  certainly  one  of  the  most  impor 
tant,  was  delivered  in  Washington  on  April  16,  1889, 
at  the  invitation  of  the  Bethel  Literary  and  Histori 
cal  Society,  which,  as  he  says,  "  comprises  the  most 
cultivated  class  of  our  people."  He  begins  by  saying  : 

"  At  no  period  since  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of 
Columbia,  have  the  moral,  social,  and  political  surroundings  of 
the  colored  people  of  this  country  been  more  solemn  and  fore 
boding  than  they  are  this  day."  ..."  Nature  has  given 
me  a  buoyant  disposition."  ..."  No  man  can  see  the  sil 
ver  lining  of  a  black  cloud  more  joyfully  than  I.  But  he  is  a 
more  hopeful  man  than  I  am,  who  will  tell  you  that  the  rights 
and  liberties  of  the  colored  people  in  this  country  have  passed 
beyond  the  danger-line."  .  .  .  "  It  is  an  ominous  fact,  that 
at  no  time  in  the  history  of  the  conflict  between  slavery  and 
freedom  in  this  country,  has  the  character  of  the  negro,  as  a 
man,  been  made  the  subject  of  a  fiercer  and  more  serious  dis 
cussion  in  all  the  avenues  of  debate,  than  during  the  past  and 
present  year."  ..."  When  the  negro  was  a  slave,  he  was 
almost  as  completely  outside  of  the  nation's  thought,  as  he  was 
outside  of  the  nation's  law  and  the  nation's  religion.  But  now 
all  is  changed.  His  freedom  makes  him  discussed  on  every 
hand.  The  platform,  the  pulpit,  the  press,  and  the  legislative 
hall  regard  him,  and  struggle  with  him,  as  a  great  and  difficult 
problem,  one  that  requires  almost  divine  wisdom  to  solve.  Men 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  375 

are  praying  over  it.     It  is  always  a  dangerous  symptom  when 
men  pray  to  know  what  is  their  duty." 

Douglass  then  protests  against  representing  his 
race  as  a  cause  of  discord  : 

"  I  deny  and  utterly  scout  the  idea,  that  there  is  now,  properly 
speaking,  any  such  thing  as  a  negro  problem  before  the  Ameri 
can  people.  It  is  not  the  negro,  educated  or  illiterate,  intelli 
gent  or  ignorant,  who  is  on  trial,  or  whose  qualities  are  giving 
trouble  to  the  nation."  ..."  The  real  question,  the  all-com 
manding  question,  is  wrhether  American  justice,  American 
liberty,  American  civilization,  American  law,  and  American 
Christianity  can  be  made  to  include  and  protect,  alike  and  for 
ever,  all  American  citizens."  ...  "  It  is  whether  this  great 
nation  shall  conquer  its  prejudices,  rise  to  the  dignity  of  its  pro 
fessions,  and  proceed  in  the  sublime  course  of  truth  and  liberty 
marked  out  for  itself  during  the  late  war,  or  shall  swing  back  to 
its  ancient  moorings  of  slavery  and  barbarism.  The  trouble  is 
that  the  colored  people  have  still  to  contend  against  '  a  fierce 
and  formidable  foe,'  the  ghost  of  a  by-gone,  dead  and  buried 
institution. 

"  One  thing  which  they  ought  to  do,  in  order  to  hold  their 
own  against  this  enemy,  is  to  give  up  cultivating  what  they  call 
4  race  pride,'  a  sentiment  too  much  like  that  which  is  '  the  lion 
in  the  way  '  of  our  progress."  .  .  .  "Do  we  not  know  that 
every  argument  we  make,  and  every  pretension  we  set  up  in 
favor  of  race  pride,  is  giving  the  enemy  a  stick  to  break  our  own 
heads?"  ...  "  You  will,  perhaps,  think  this  criticism  uncalled 
for.  My  answer  is  that  truth  is  never  uncalled  for."  ..."  In 
some  of  our  colored  public  journals  I  have  seen  myself  charged 
with  a  lack  of  race  pride.  I  am  not  ashamed  of  that  charge.  I 
have  no  apology  or  vindication  to  offer.  If  fifty  years  of  un 
compromising  devotion  to  the  cause  of  the  colored  man  in  this 
country  does  not  vindicate  me,  I  am  content  to  live  without 
vindication.  While  I  have  no  more  reason  to  be  proud  of  one 
race  than  another,  I  dare  to  say,  and  I  fear  no  contradiction, 


376  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

that  there  is  no  other  man  in  the  United  States  prouder  than 
myself  of  any  great  achievement,  mental  or  mechanical,  of  which 
any  colored  man  or  woman  is  the  author.  This  not  because  I 
am  a  colored  man,  but  because  I  am  a  man  ;  and  because  color 
is  a  misfortune,  and  is  treated  as  a  crime  by  the  American 
people." 

He  also  protests  against  the  preference  shown  by 
the  colored  people  for  dwelling  by  themselves,  and 
carrying  on  separate  churches,  schools,  benevolent 
and  literary  societies  : 

"  There  are  buildings  which  will  hold  a  few,  but  which  will 
break  down  under  the  weight  of  a  crowd.  The  ice  of  the  river 
may  be  strong  enough  to  bear  a  man,  but  would  break  through 
under  the  weight  of  an  elephant.  The  ice  under  us  in  this 
country  is  very  thin,  and  is  made  very  weak  by  the  warm  fogs 
of  prejudice."  ..."  Our  policy  should  be  to  unite  with  the 
great  mass  of  the  American  people  in  all  their  activities,  and 
resolve  to  fall  or  flourish  with  our  common  country.  We  cannot 
afford  to  draw  the  color-line  in  politics,  trade,  education,  man 
ners,  religion,  fashion,  or  civilization.  Especially  we  cannot 
afford  to  draw  the  color-line  in  politics.  No  folly  could  be 
greater.  A  party  acting  on  that  basis  would  be  not  merely  a 
misfortune,  but  a  dire  calamity  to  our  people." 

It  is  admitted  that  the  terror  excited  among  the 
blacks  by  Cleveland's  election  "turned  out  to  be 
groundless  ;"  but  it  is  complained  that  after  the  in 
auguration, 

"  He  said  no  word  and  did  no  act,  expressed  no  desire  to 
arrest  the  hand  of  violence,  to  stay  the  effusion  of  innocent 
blood,  or  to  vindicate  in  any  manner  the  negro's  constitutional 
right  to  vote."  ..."  Well,  now  the  American  people  have  re 
turned  the  Republican  party  to  power ;  and  the  question  is,  what 
will  it  do  ?  "  .  .  .  "  For  a  dozen  years  and  more  the  Republican 
party  has  seemed  in  a  measure  paralyzed  in  the  presence  of 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  377 

high-handed  fraud  and  brutal  violence  toward  its  newly-made 
citizens.  The  question  now  is,  will  it  regain  its  former  health, 
activity,  and  power  ?  Will  it  be  as  true  to  its  friends  in  the 
South  as  the  Democratic  party  has  been  to  its  friends  in  that 
section,  or  will  it  sacrifice  its  friends  to  conciliate  its  enemies  ?  " 
..."  Not  only  the  negro  but  all  honest  men,  north  and  south, 
must  hold  the  Republican  party  in  contempt,  if  it  fails  to  do  its 
whole  duty  at  this  point.  The  Republican  party  has  made  the 
colored  man  free ;  and  the  Republican  party  must  make  him 
secure  in  his  freedom,  or  abandon  its  pretensions. 

"  It  was  once  said  by  Abraham  Lincoln  that  this  Republic 
could  not  long  endure  half  slave  and  half  free ;  and  the  same 
may  be  said  with  even  more  truth  of  the  black  citizens  of  this 
country.  They  cannot  remain  half  slave  and  half  free.  They 
must  be  one  thing  or  the  other.  And  this  brings  me  to  consider 
the  alternative  now  presented  between  slavery  and  freedom  in 
this  country.  From  my  outlook,  I  am  free  to  affirm  that  I  see 
nothing  for  the  negro  of  the  South  but  a  condition  of  absolute 
freedom,  or  of  absolute  slavery.  I  see  no  half-way  place  for 
him.  One  or  the  other  of  these  conditions  is  to  solve  the  so- 
called  negro  problem.  There  are  forces  at  work  in  both  of 
these  directions,  and  for  the  present  that  which  aims  at  the  re- 
enslavement  of  the  negro  seems  to  have  the  advantage.  Let  it 
be  remembered  that  the  labor  of  the  negro  is  his  only  capital. 
Take  this  from  him,  and  he  dies  from  starvation.  The  present 
mode  of  obtaining  his  labor  in  the  South  gives  the  old  master 
class  a  complete  mastery  over  him.  I  showed  this  in  my  last 
annual  celebration  address,  and  I  need  not  go  into  it  here.  The 
payment  of  the  negro  by  orders  on  stores,  where  the  store 
keeper  controls  price,  quality,  and  quantity,  and  is  subject  to  no 
competition,  so  that  the  negro  must  buy  there  and  nowhere  else 
— an  arrangement  by  which  the  negro  never  has  a  dollar  to  lay 
by,  and  can  be  kept  in  debt  to  his  employer,  year  in  and  year 
out — puts  him  completely  at  the  mercy  of  the  old  master-class. 
He  who  could  say  to  the  negro,  when  a  slave,  you  shall  work 
for  me  or  be  whipped  to  death,  can  now  say  to  him  with  equal 
emphasis,  you  shall  work  for  me,  or  I  will  starve  you  to  death. 


37§  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

This  is  the  plain,  matter-of-fact,  and  unexaggerated  condition 
of  the  plantation  negro  in  the  Southern  States  to-day." 

He  is  further  wronged,  it  is  said,  by  being  pre 
vented  from  emigrating  as  well  as  from  keeping  weap 
ons  in  his  cabin.  If  he  becomes  a  criminal,  "  The 
law  puts  him  on  the  auction  block  and  sells  him  to 
the  highest  bidder."  .  .  .  "  No  adequate  means 
of  education  has  been  provided  for  him  ;  his  vote 
avails  him  nothing  ;  he,  of  all  men  is  easiest  con 
victed  of  crime  ;  he  does  not  see  or  receive  a  dollar 
in  payment  of  wrages  ;  and,  by  the  opinion  of  the 
Supreme  Court,  the  Fourteenth  Amendment  affords 
him  no  protection." 

But  the  nation  is  stronger  than  the  oppressors. 
"  They  may  rob  the  negro  of  his  vote  to-day,  but  the 
negro  will  have  his  vote  to-morrow.  The  spirit  of 
the  age  is  with  him."  .  .  .  "If  the  Republican 
party  shall  fail  to  carry  out  this  purpose,  God  will 
raise  up  another  party  that  will  be  faithful." 

"  There  is  still  another  ground  for  hope  for  the  freedom  of 
the  Southern  States.  It  is  that  the  good  citizens  of  these 
States  cannot  afford  and  will  not  consent  always,  to  lag  far  be 
hind  the  old  free  States  in  all  the  elements  of  civilization."  .  .  . 
"  They  have  rich  resources  to  be  developed,  and  they  want  both 
men  and  money  to  develop  them  and  enhance  their  prosperity. 
The  wise  and  loyal  people  in  these  States  know  very  well  that 
they  can  never  be  prosperous,  that  they  can  never  have  their 
share  of  emigration,  from  at  home  or  abroad,  while  they  are 
known  and  distinguished  for  intolerance,  fraud,  violence,  and 
lynch  law.  They  know  that  while  this  character  attaches  to 
them,  capital  will  hold  aloof  from  them,  and  population  will 
shun  them,  as  it  would  shun  a  land  blasted  by  pestilence."  .  .  . 
"  They  know  that  industrious  and  enterprising  men,  searching 
for  homes,  will  turn  their  backs  upon  the  South,  and  make  their 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  379 

way  to  the  West  and  North,  where  they  can  hold  and  express 
their  opinions  without  fear  of  the  bowie-knife  and  shot-gun  of 
the  assassin.  Thus  the  self-interest  of  the  people  of  these 
States  will  yet  teach  them  justice,  humanity,  and  civilization." 
.  .  .  "The  spirit  of  justice,  liberty,  and  fair  play  is  abroad  in 
the  land."  ..."  It  has  an  agent  in  every  bar  of  railroad  iron, 
a  servant  in  every  electric  wire,  a  missionary  in  every  traveller." 
..."  States,  parties,  and  leaders  must,  and  will  in  the  end,  ad 
just  themselves  to  this  overwhelming  and  irresistible  tendency." 

These  last  words  indicate  the  true  solution  of  a 
problem,  which  we  know  to  be  both  difficult  and  ur 
gent.  Its  importance  is  manifest,  even  in  the  com 
paratively  simple  form  in  which  it  meets  us  at  the 
North.  Here  at  least,  there  is  no  conceivable  reason 
why  all  colored  people  should  not  be  treated  accord 
ing  to  the  merits  of  each  individual.  It  is  not  only 
the  plain  duty,  but  also  the  interest  of  us  all,  to  have 
every  colored  man  take  the  place  for  which  he  is  best 
fitted  by  education,  character,  ability,  manners,  and 
culture.  If  others  insist  on  keeping  him  in  any  lower 
and  poorer  place,  it  is  not  only  his  injury,  but  our 
universal  loss.  Yet  which  of  our  white  congrega 
tions  would  take  a  colored  pastor  ?  How  many  of 
our  New  England  villages  would  like  to  have  colored 
postmasters,  or  doctors,  or  lawyers,  or  teachers  in  the 
public  schools?  A  very  slight  difference  in  com 
plexion  suffices  to  keep  a  young  man  from  getting  a 
place  as  policeman,  or  fireman,  or  conductor,  even  on 
the  horse  cars.  The  trades-unions  are  closed  against 
him,  and*  so  are  many  of  our  stores  ;  while  those 
which  admit  him  are  obliged  to  refuse  him  promo 
tion  on  account  of  the  unwillingness  of  white  men  to 
serve  under  him.  Colored  girls  find  dressmakers 


380  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

who  would  employ  them  to  be  "  as  scarce  as  hens' 
teeth."  It  is  hard  for  them  to  get  places  behind 
counters  or  in  factories  :  and  there  is  some  prejudice 
against  them  as  domestic  servants.  One  poor  girl  in 
Iowa,  who  had  been  highly  educated,  could  get  no 
employment  except  in  a  drudgery  under  which  she 
speedily  died.  Rich  people  who  wish  to  hire  suita 
ble  houses  in  Boston  find  the  color-line  drawn  against 
them.  A  candidate  for  office  in  the  capital  city  of 
Kansas  found  seven-eights  of  the  white  Republicans 
desert  him,  because  his  skin  was  darker  than  theirs  ; 
and  a  Philadelphia  writer  on  this  subject,  Mr.  A.  K. 
McClure,  declares  that  such  prejudice  was  much 
stronger  in  his  own  State,  in  1886,  than  in  South 
Carolina.  The  recent  refusal  of  the  Episcopal  Con 
vention  to  recognize  negro  ministers  as  equal  to  their 
brethren,  has  called  out  far  too  little  protest  in 
Northern  churches  ;  and  there  are  frequent  instances 
of  denial  of  civil  rights  in  our  Western  cities.  We 
see,  however,  that  there  has  been  great  improvement 
throughout  the  North  during  the  last  fifty  years. 

May  we  not  hope,  that  there  has  been  some  im 
provement  in  the  South  also,  and  that  Charles  Dudley 
Warner  is  right  in  saying  that  "  There  is  generally 
good-will "  toward  the  negro,  "  desire  that  he  shall 
be  educated  and  become  thrifty."  The  South  has 
not  yet  wholly  ceased  to  be  unjust.  Many  freedmen 
are  lynched,  or  sentenced  to  excessively  long  terms 
of  suffering  under  the  atrocious  system  of  farming 
out  convicts.  Laborers  continue  to  be  swindled, 
travellers  to  be  molested,  and  ballot-boxes  to  be  kept 
out  of  reach.  The  extent  to  which  these  abuses  pre 
vail  is  often  exaggerated,  however  ;  the  condition  of 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  381 

the  freedmen  has,  I  think,  on  the  whole,  improved 
greatly  since  they  were  emancipated  ;  and  I  believe 
that  many  of  their  white  neighbors  and  employers 
would  say,  with  Mr.  Grady,  "We  want  to  bar  them 
from  no  avenue  in  which  their  feet  are  fitted  to 
tread."  The  sincerity  of  such  language  is  proved  by 
the  fact,  stated  by  Dr.  Haygood  as  well  as  by  the 
National  Bureau  of  Education,  that  every  southern 
State  now  provides  as  liberally  for  educating  colored 
children  as  white.  The  schools  are  separate ;  and 
this  gives  employment  to  thousands  of  colored  teach 
ers.  The  South  will  undoubtedly  continue  to  edu 
cate  and  elevate  the  freedman  ;  for  he  will  always 
form  so  large  and  so  necessary  a  part  of  her  popu 
lation,  that  he  cannot  safely  be  left  in  ignorance. 
Her  need  of  skilled  labor  is  increasing  rapidly  ;  and 
even  the  field-hand  would  be  much  more  valuable  if 
he  could  be  taught  to  treat  animals  more  kindly, 
remember  orders  more  faithfully,  and  abstain  entirely 
from  pilfering.  The  health  of  the  white  people  re 
quires  that  the  negro  cabin  be  kept  clean  ;  and  the 
maintenance  of  chastity  there  is  necessary  for  the 
protection  of  woman  throughout  the  land.  The  need 
of  making  the  black  man  more  intelligent  and  con 
scientious  has  already  been  so  far  recognized  by  the 
South,  that  she  has  remodelled  herentire  school  system 
for  his  benefit  ;  and  her  desire  to  make  him  more 
valuable  as  a  member  of  the  community,  cannot  long 
permit  him  to  be  lynched  or  otherwise  maltreated. 
Her  memory  of  the  misrule  of  the  carpet-baggers 
will  grow  fainter  ;  and  she  will  finally  be  able  to  see 
that  even  the  illiterate  voter  is  not  so  dangerous  a 
citizen  in  a  republic  as  the  man  who  has  not  this 


382  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

reason  to  interest  himself  in  its  welfare.  The  South 
may  be  much  slower  than  we  could  wish  in  reaching 
these  conclusions  ;  but  no  others  will  be  found  per 
manently  satisfactory  to  her  ;  and  it  is  by  no  means 
certain  that  her  pace  will  be  quickened  by  a  display 
of  federal  bayonets. 

This  is  substantially  the  view  "  of  many  thoughtful 
colored  men,  who  care  more  for  race  than  for  party, 
and  more  for  country  than  for  race."  These  last 
words  are  quoted  from  a  letter,  in  the  "  Boston 
Post"  of  August  17,  1889,  by  Mr.  Archibald  H. 
Grimke,  who  is  confident  that  the  old  regime  under 
which  his  brethren  now  suffer  at  the  South,  "is 
crumbling  under  the  action  of  new  moral  ideas,"  and 
"new  industrial  forces."  These  are  creating  "a 
nobler  public  opinion  ;"  and  "The  New  South  is  in 
very  truth  the  CEdipus  who  is  destined  to  solve  the 
southern  riddle."  Both  the  New  South  and  the  Old 
are  determined  not  to  let  outsiders  interfere,  nor  to 
suffer  "a  return  of  negro  domination."  "Between 
the  existing  order  and  that  terrible  disorder,  no  sane 
man  would  hesitate  to  choose  the  existing  order  with 
all  its  evils.  For  myself,  I  would  prefer  the  existing 
order  a  thousand  times,  to  that  swarm  and  saturnalia 
of  fools  and  scamps  which  the  appalling  ignorance 
and  poverty  of  the  blacks  made  possible  fifteen 
years  ago." 

The  first  duty  of  the  North  is  to  purify  herself 
from  those  prejudices  which  now  encourage  oppres 
sion  at  the  South.  The  need  of  industrial  education 
among  the  freedmen  is  still  so  great  that  institutions 
which  furnish  it  deserve  liberal  endowments,  not  only 
from  rich  individuals  but  from  the  Government, 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  383 

though  we  need  not  think  of  offering  charity  to 
States  which  have  doubled  their  school  funds  since 
1880.  The  interests  of  the  colored  laborer  should  be 
considered  in  revising  the  tariff.  The  only  way  of 
solving  the  color-problem  is  by  the  cordial  co-opera 
tion  of  all  classes  and  races  at  the  South.  Any 
attempt  to  set  race  against  race  will  injure  the  blacks 
even  more  than  the  whites.  They  have  interests 
enough  in  common  to  insure  the  ultimate  elevation 
of  the  negro  to  the  high  place  necessary  for  the  com 
mon  welfare. 

An  opportunity  to  study  the  negro  character  from 
a  new  standpoint  was  given  to  Douglass,  as  he  was 
appointed  Minister  to  a  country  in  which  he  has 
always  felt  deep  interest.  As  he  wrote  to  his  friend, 
Dr.  Bowditch,  on  July  4,  1889,  "With  many  misgiv 
ings,  I  accepted  the  mission  to  Hayti.  I  distrusted 
my  qualifications  for  the  office  ;  but  coming  to  me  as 
it  did,  unasked,  unsought,  and  unexpected,  and  with 
the  earnest  wish  of  the  President  that  I  would  accept 
it  in  the  interest  of  the  peace,  welfare,  and  prosperity 
of  Hayti,  I  felt  I  could  not  decline  it.  I  shall  leave  a 
comfortable  house  and  a  healthy  climate,  and  shall 
probably  have  to  occupy  trying  positions  ;  but  I  go 
forth  hopefully."  ...  "  Hayti  is  but  a  child  in  na 
tional  life,  and  though  she  may  often  stumble  and 
fall,  I  predict  that  she  will  yet  grow  strong  and 
bright." 

Just  as  he  was  about  to  leave  Washington,  he  wrote 
a  letter  which  was  read  in  the  Tremont  Temple,  Bos 
ton,  at  the  Reunion  of  the  Abolitionists,  on  Monday, 
September  23,  to  celebrate  Lincoln's  first  proclama 
tion  of  emancipation.  "  You  meet  "  he  says, tl  in  Bos- 


34  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

ton,  at  a  time  still  critical  if  not  alarming.  Slavery 
has  left  behind  it  a  spirit  that  still  delights  in  human 
blood.  Outrage,  murder,  and  assassination  are  the 
inheritance  of  the  freed  men  and  women  of  the 
South.  Neither  our  government  nor  our  civilization 
seems  able  to  stop  the  flow  of  blood.  As  in  the  time 
of  slavery,  the  Church  is  silent." 

The  sensational  stories,  set  afloat  soon  after,  about 
the  unwillingness  of  naval  officers  to  take  a  colored 
passenger,  are  proved  to  be  false  by  the  testimony 
of  Secretary  Tracy  and  Mr.  Walter  Elaine,  as  well  as 
of  Douglass  himself  in  a  letter  from  Port  au  Prince. 
He  arrived  there,  on  October  8th,  after  a  smooth  pas 
sage,  which  was  made  very  pleasant  for  his  compan 
ions  by  his  animated  accounts  of  his  early  life.  On 
being  asked  why  he  left  his  comfortable  home  for  a 
benighted  and  turbulent  country,  he  said:  "I  am 
tired  of  having  Hayti  thrown  in  my  face  :  I  am  going 
now  to  see  for  myself."  Four  days  after  landing,  he 
was  able  so  far  to  carry  out  his  plans  as  to  take  pos 
session  of  the  Villa  Tivoli,  which,  according  to  the 
"  New  York  Evening  Post  "  is  "  an  unpretentious  res 
idence  on  the  heights  overlooking  the  lower  town 
and  the  bay,  and  like  all  these  villas,  even  the  best  of 
them,  rather  dilapidated,  and  enclosed  by  a  jungle 
of  tropical  growth  aflame  with  gorgeous  blossoms  ; 
palms  shading  the  avenue  between  the  gateway  and 
the  wide  veranda,  before  which  is  a  little  fountain, 
the  soothing  fall  of  whose  water  is  suggestive  of  cool 
ness  and  shade."  The  Haytian  Minister  at  Washing 
ton,  Mr.  Preston,  says  that  the  rumors  which  have 
been  circulating  about  the  unwillingness  of  the  rulers 
of  the  black  republic  to  receive  Douglass  cordially, 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  385 

had  no  foundation,  except  in  the  disappointment  of 
certain  New  York  merchants,  who  had  tried  in  vain 
to  hire  him  to  act  as  their  agent  in  pressing  claims 
upon  the  Haytian  Government.  I  have  heard  that 
they  offered  him  heavy  bribes,  soon  after  his  appoint 
ment  ;  but  he  answered,  that  all  proposals,  for  his 
undertaking  any  kind  of  business  in  Hayti,  must  be 
sent  to  him  through  the  State  Department. 

The  new  President,  Hyppolite,  said  in  his  inaugu 
ral  address,  that  "  Hayti  ought  to  be  proud  of  the 
sympathy  with  this  administration,  which  has  been 
shown  so  abundantly  by  the  United  States,"  and  that 
"  The  greatest  proof  of  regard  which  that  country 
has  given  us,  is  unquestionably  her  sending  to  Port 
au  Prince,  as  Minister  Resident  and  Consul  General, 
Hon.  Frederick  Douglass,  that  illustrious  champion 
of  all  men  of  African  descent,  himself  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  scions  of  that  race  whose  represen 
tatives  in  America  we  are  proud  to  be." 

While  spending  his  vacation  in  this  country,  last 
summer,  Mr.  Douglass  told  me  that  he  had  found 
everything  in  Hayti  delightful,  except  the  climate  ; 
and  on  September  10,  he  sent  me  the  following  letter  : 

"DEAR  MR.  HOLLAND: — 

"  In  answer  to  your  question  in  respect  of  my  relations  with 
the  government  of  Hayti  and  whether  they  were  cordial  or 
otherwise,  I  have  to  state  that,  while  the  office  of  United  States 
Minister  Resident  and  Consul  General  to  Hayti  was  vacant, 
and  prior  to  my  nomination  to  that  position  by  President  Har 
rison,  an  honor  accorded  to  me  without  any  solicitation  on  my 
part  or  on  that  of  my  friends,  the  policy  of  sending  a  colored 
citizen  to  represent  our  country  at  that  important  post  was  ser 
iously  discussed,  and  such  appointment  condemned  in  the  col- 


386  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

umns  of  certain  papers  published  in  New  York  City  and  else 
where.  After  I  was  appointed,  the  subject  was  continued  and 
discussed  with  even  more  emphasis  and  bitterness.  Notwith 
standing  the  fact  that  Hayti  is  known  as  the  '  Black  Republic  ' 
and  that  her  people  are  of  the  African  race,  it  was  contended 
that  she  did  not  want  a  colored  representative  in  her  capital  in 
the  high  quality  of  Minister  Resident  and  Consul  General  of  the 
United  States,  but  that  she  very  much  preferred  to  have  a  white 
man  sent  to  her  in  that  quality.  As  for  me,  personally,  it  was 
contended  that  I  was  especially  objectionable ;  and  that  I  was 
so,  not  only  on  account  of  my  color,  but  on  account  also  of  my 
political  opinions.  It  was  given  out  that  I  had  at  one  time 
(that  is  twenty  years  ago)  favored  the  annexation  of  Santo 
Domingo  to  the  United  States,  a  measure  to  which  Hayti  was 
strenuously  opposed,  and  that  the  latter  would  be  likely  to  re 
sent  the  presence  in  her  capital  of  a  Minister  who  had  supported 
a  policy  which  she  deemed  offensive  and  dangerous.  It  made 
no  difference  to  these  writers,  that  annexation  had  ceased  to 
be  a  living  question,  and  that  it  had  long  since  been  abandoned 
both  by  the  Government  of  the  United  States  and  by  Santo  Do 
mingo.  It  was  found  to  be  a  convenient  circumstance  by  which 
to  stir  up  bad  feeling  in  Hayti  against  me,  and  it  was  no 
fault  of  theirs  if  it  did  not  succeed.  Some  of  these  papers 
went  so  far  as  to  intimate  very  unpatriotically,  that  I  was 
especially  sent  to  Hayti  for  the  purpose  of  advancing  some 
scheme  of  annexation,  not  only  of  Santo  Domingo  but  of 
Hayti.  They  were  not  troubled  in  these  utterances  by  the 
absurdity  of  the  pretence,  that  color  would  be  an  objection 
to  me  in  a  black  or  colored  republic.  They  took  no  note 
that,  at  the  time  I  favored  the  annexation  of  Santo  Domingo, 
it  was  only  because  that  country  was  supposed  to  desire 
it.  They  could  not  see  that  being  herself  pretty  deeply  col 
ored,  and  her  citizens  considerably  under  the  ban  on  account 
of  color  in  the  United  States,  Hayti  would  naturally  be  pleased 
to  see  one  of  her  own  complexion  honored  by  the  appointment 
to  the  Haytian  Mission.  All  that  they  seemed  to  aim  at,  or  to 
desire,  was  to  create  the  impression  that  a  white  man,  and  not 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  387 

a  colored  man,  was  the  proper  description  of  man  to  be  sent  to 
Hayti.  It  was  amusing  to  witness  the  high  professions  of 
respect  on  the  part  of  these  journals  for  the  feelings  and  pref 
erences  of  Hayti,  professions  that  struck  me,  considering 
their  source,  to  be  too  vehement  to  be  sincere,  and  too  un 
usual  to  be  ascribed  to  nature.  There  was  ample  room  to  sus 
pect  a  motive  for  this  opposition  less  creditable  and  generous 
than  any  wholesome  concern  for  either  the  interest  or  the  feel 
ings  of  Hayti.  Quite  a  flood  of  light  fell  upon  the  whole  sub 
ject,  when  it  was  said  that  the  New  York  merchants  were  unan 
imously  opposed  to  sending  a  colored  representative  of  the 
United  States  to  Hayti.  It  at  once  became  plain  that  an  Amer 
ican  and  not  a  Haytian  motive  was  at  the  bottom  of  this  color 
opposition. 

"  But  whatever  may  have  been  the  motive,  whether  it  arose 
from  my  color,  my  character,  or  my  known  record  as  a  public 
man,  the  opposition  was  spirited,  vigorous,  persistent,  and  mis 
chievous  ;  for  nothing  was  said  against  me  that  was  not  repro 
duced  and  repeated  in  Hayti.  A  people  less  generous  and  in 
telligent  than  those  who  control  affairs  there  might  have  been 
made  to  feel  that  the  United  States  had  designedly  insulted 
them  by  sending  me  to  their  country.  But,  fortunately,  they 
did  not  so  think  or  act.  Having,  however,  predicted  that  I 
would  be  unacceptable  to  the  people  and  Government  of  Hayti, 
it  was  perhaps  natural  that  these  prophets  of  evil  should  en 
deavor  to  create  the  impression  that  their  predictions  had  been 
realized.  Hence  it  was  said  in  the  same  papers,  that  I  was 
having  a  hard  time  in  Hayti,  that  I  had  been  '  snubbed  '  by  that 
Government,  that  I  was  about  to  resign,  and  much  else  of  the 
same  sort.  Undue  advantage  was  taken  after  my  arrival  in 
Hayti,  of  the  fact  that  some  delay  occurred  in  my  presen 
tation  to  President  Hyppolite.  The  facts  in  the  case  will 
explain  all  this.  I  arrived  in  Hayti  on  the  8th  of  October, 
1889.  At  that  time  the  country  was  just  emerging  from 
one  of  the  most  exciting  revolutions  which  had  occurred 
there  in  many  years.  The  government  of  General  Solomon 
had  been  overthrown  the  year  before ;  and  there  had  sue- 


388  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

ceeded  to  it  the  government  of  General  Legitime,  which 
was  never  recognized  by  the  United  States.  This  gov 
ernment  had  lasted  but  a  few  months,  when  its  President  was 
driven  from  power  and  banished  from  the  country.  The  city 
of  Port  au  Prince  was  under  martial  law  ;  and  sixteen  thousand 
troops  were  in  its  streets.  The  Government  I  found  there  was 
simply  titular  and  provisional ;  but  a  convention  to  frame  a  new 
constitution  was  in  progress  in  the  neighboring  city  of  Gonalves. 
This  convention  was  charged  with  the  duty  of  electing  a  Presi 
dent  of  the  Republic  and  thus  inaugurating  a  permanent  gov 
ernment.  This  they  did  by  electing  General  Florvil  Hyppolite 
President  for  a  term  of  seven  years.  Even  after  this  election, 
the  necessary  delay  in  receiving  my  letter  of  credence  hindered 
my  prompt  presentation  to  the  newly  elected  President,  to  whom 
I  was  subsequently  accredited.  During  the  interim  between 
my  arrival  in  Hayti  and  my  presentation  to  President  Hyppolite, 
Mr.  Thompson,  my  predecessor,  who  had  long  before  sent  in 
his  letter  of  resignation  (which  had  been  accepted  by  our  Gov 
ernment),  and  who,  as  I  had  supposed,  had  previously  to  my 
arrival  departed  from  Hayti,  as  he  had  requested  permission  to 
do,  still  remained,  and  for  a  time,  in  view  of  the  fact  that  I 
had  not  presented  my  letter  of  credence,  nor  been  formally 
received  by  the  Government,  allowed  himself  to  be  con 
sidered  as  the  then  present  representative  of  the  United  States 
Government,  notwithstanding  my  presence  in  the  Haytian  cap 
ital  and  my  assumption  there  of  the  duties  and  control  of  the 
United  States  Legation.  This  circumstance,  no  doubt,  gave 
rise  to  the  rumor  in  the  United  States  of  unpleasant  relations 
between  myself  and  the  Government  of  Hayti.  The  delay  in 
my  reception  was  just  long  enough  to  be  used  in  New  York, 
with  all  proper  exaggeration,  to  create  the  impression  that  my 
relations  with  the  Haytian  Government  were  not  cordial,  and 
to  justify  the  conclusion  to  which  those  papers  had  already 
come,  that  a  white  man  should  have  been  sent  to  Hayti  in  my 
stead.  Happily,  this  embarrassment  did  not  last  long.  As 
soon  as  my  letter  of  credence  arrived,  I  was  duly  presented  to 
His  Excellency,  President  Hyppolite,  and  from  that  time  on- 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  389 

ward  my  relations  with  the  Haytian  Government  were  entirely 
cordial,  and  no  respect  due  to  my  person  or  to  my  country  was 
ever  afterward  withheld  by  the  Government  or  by  the  people  of 
Hayti.  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS." 

Shortly  before  sending  the  above  letter,  Douglass 
visited  a  camp-meeting  near  Baltimore,  on  Sunday, 
September  7,  and  made  a  speech  in  which,  after  re 
ferring  to  the  time  when  "  The  American  eagle  laid 
bad  eggs,"  he  said  : 

"  Our  American  friends  are  apt,  when  they  want  to  say  any 
thing  against  us,  to  remark  :  '  Look  at  Hayti ;  these  negroes 
cannot  govern  themselves  there  ;  why  here  ?  '  There  is  some 
thing  about  Hayti  which  we  have  to  deplore,  and  so  there  is 
about  the  United  States.  Let  us  go  back  100  years  and  look 
at  Hayti,  and  we  find  it  surrounded  by  slavery  and  the  whole 
Caribbean  Sea  reddened  by  the  curse.  The  negro  was  a  slave 
everywhere,  under  every  nation  in  the  islands  of  the  West  Indies. 
But  in  the  midst  of  that  slavery,  in  the  midst  of  that  doom  and 
despair,  they  had  the  manhood  to  rise  from  the  dust  and  shake 
off  the  fetters  and  drive  out  the  men  who  tyrannized  them. 
Since  then  Napoleon,  with  his  30,000  invaders  and  troops  from 
England,  have  tried  to  throw  them  back ;  but,  with  the  help  of 
'  Yellow  Jack,'  they  have  held  their  ground.  These  degraded, 
stupid  negroes  were  able  not  only  to  assert  their  liberty,  but  to 
organize  a  government  which  they  have  carried  on  for  eighty- 
seven  years.  They  have  sent  their  Ministers  to  all  Christian 
lands,  and  Hayti  has  never  been  known  to  break  a  treaty. 
Some  of  the  papers  said,  not  long  since :  '  Send  a  white  man 
as  Minister  to  Hayti,  for  the  people  of  that  country  would  re 
sent  a  negro.'  Well,  there  is  always  a  demand  made  for  a  white 
man,  when  there  is  $5000  attached  to  the  office.  I  have  been 
shown  every  courtesy  and  I  have  not  the  slightest  reason  to 
complain.  I  believe  the  press  has  become  reconciled  to  my 
presence  in  the  office,  except  those  that  have  a  candidate  for  it, 
and  they  give  out  that  I  am  going  to  resign.  At  them  I  fling 


39°  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

the  old  adage, '  Few  die,  and  none  resign,'  and  that  I  am  going 
back  about  Oct.  i." 

In  speaking  at  the  Abolitionist  Reunion  in  Boston, 
on  September  22,  1890,  Douglass  said  : 

"  A  word  about  Hayti.  We  are  not  to  judge  her  by  the 
height  which  the  Anglo-Saxon  has  reached.  We  are  to  judge 
by  the  depths  from  which  she  has  come.  We  are  to  look  at  the 
relation  she  sustained  to  the  outside  world,  and  the  outside 
world  sustained  to  her.  One  hundred  years  ago  every  civilized 
nation  was  slave-holding.  Yet  these  negroes,  ignorant,  down 
trodden,  had  the  manhood  to  arise  and  drive  off  their  masters 
and  assert  their  liberty.  Her  government  is  not  so  unsteady  as 
we  think." 

He  also,  that  morning,  defended  our  pension 
system,  which  had  been  criticised  by  a  previous 
speaker;  and  he  added:  "  The  Abolitionists  were  right 
in  their  attitude  to  the  Church.  Slavery  and  the 
Church  were  side  by  side  :  the  Church  was  at  peace 
with  slavery  :  men  were  sold  to  build  churches,  women 
sold  to  pay  missionaries,  and  children  sold  to  buy 
Bibles.  We  did  right  to  oppose  it." 

The  great  event  of  the  occasion  was  his  speech  that 
evening,  in  Tremont  Temple.  The  immense  audience 
greeted  him  with  round  after  round  of  applause. 
Then  followed  a  general  laugh,  as  he  held  up  a  big 
packet  of  manuscript  and  dropped  it,  with  the  words  : 
"All  my  thunder  has  been  stolen  by  the  friends  who 
have  already  spoken  ;  so  I  lay  this  thunderbolt 
aside."  He  then  insisted  that  "  There  is  no  race  prob 
lem  before  the  country,  but  only  a  political  one,  the 
question  whether  a  Republican  has  any  right  to  exist 
south  of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line."  There  is  still  a 
great  deal  of  prejudice,  even  in  the  North,  against 


THE  NATION'S  PROBLEM.  . .      391 

colored  people  ;  but  he  has  found  out  that  the  only 
way  to  cure  it,  is  to  treat  them  kindly.  This  he  proved 
by  the  fact  that  at  Pittsfield,  Ne"/  Hampshire,  forty- 
eight  years  before,  Mrs.  Norris  had  been  helped,  by 
doing  him  a  kindness,  to  shake  off  her  prejudice 
against  his  color  and  his  views  so  thoroughly  as  to  be 
the  first  to  shake  hands  with  him  after  his  lecture.  It 
had  been  said,  by  the  clergyman  who  preceded  him, 
that  it  was  not  the  Garrisonians  who  abolished 
slavery,  nor  the  Republicans  either,  but  Almighty 
God.  "  The  good  Lord  had  had  a  chance  for  a  long 
time  before  the  abolition.  I  believe  that  there  is  a 
moral  government  ;  and  that  God  reigns.  I  am  no 
pessimist  ;  I  give  thanks  to  the  good  Lord,  and  also 
to  the  good  men  through  whom  He  has  worked. 
Prominent  among  them  was  Garrison,  and  scarcely 
less  so  was  Phillips.  It  was  they  and  their  asso 
ciates  who  made  Abraham  Lincoln  and  the  Republi 
can  party  possible.  What  abolished  slavery  was  the 
moral  sentiment  which  had  been  created,  not  by  the 
pulpit,  but  by  the  Garrisonian  platform.  The 
churches  did  not  do  much  to  abolish  slavery  ;  but 
they  did  much  to  keep  the  agitation  down."  He  saw 
no  danger  of  negro  supremacy  at  the  South,  nor  any 
cause  of  alarm  to  the  white  people  "  who  have  a 
thousand  years  of  civilization  piled  up  in  their  three- 
story  heads."  "lam  just  as  white  myself  as  I  am 
black  ;  and  I  am  not  afraid  of  the  negro  getting  the 
upper  hand  in  me."  Finally  he  rose  to  a  power  of 
pathos,  which  carried  away  the  whole  audience,  as  he 
said,  in  pleading  for  the  Blair  and  Lodge  bills,  "If 
you  build  the  negro  a  church  on  every  hill,  and  a 
schoolhouse  in  every  valley,  and  endow  them  all  for 


392  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

a  hundred  years,  you  will  not  make  up  for  the  wrongs 
you  have  done  him.  Who  is  it  that  asks  for  protection 
at  the  polls  and  for  equal  education  ?  The  men  who 
came  forth  to  clutch  with  iron  fingers  your  faltering 
ilag,  and  shed  their  blood  for  you,  who  protected  the 
women  and  children  of  the  South  during  the  war, 
who  have  tilled  your  soil  with  their  horny  hands,  and 
watered  it  with  their  tears  !  " 

Four  weeks  later  he  made  an  address  to  the  Bethel 
Literary  and  Historical  Association,  in  Washington, 
and,  after  asserting  the  right  of  colored  men  to  vote 
and  marry  as  they  choose,  closed  with  noble  words 
which  we  may  accept  as  his  farewell  before  departing 
once  more  to  Hayti,  on  December  7  : 

"  I  have  no  doubt  whatever  of  the  future.  I  know  there  are 
times  in  the  history  of  all  reforms,  when  the  future  looks  dark." 
...  "I,  for  one,  have  gone  through  all  this.  I  have  had 
fifty  years  of  it,  and  yet  I  have  not  lost  either  heart  or  hope." 
...  "I  have  seen  dark  hours  in  my  life,  and  I  have  seen 
the  darkness  gradually  disappearing,  and  the  light  gradually 
increasing.  One  by  one,  I  have  seen  obstacles  removed,  errors 
corrected,  prejudices  softened,  proscriptions  relinquished,  and 
my  people  advancing  in  all  the  elements  that  make  up  the  sum 
of  general  welfare.  And  I  remember  that  God  reigns  in  eter 
nity,  and  that,  whatever  delays,  disappointments,  and  discour 
agements  may  come,  truth,  justice,  liberty,  and  humanity  will 
ultimately  prevail," 


CHAPTER   XV. 

CONCLUSION. 

LOOKING  at  Douglass  as  an  orator,  his  life  may 
be  divided  into  four  periods. 

First  come  the  twenty-four  years  of  preparation, 
before  he  mounted  the  platform  in  1841.  During 
this  time,  he  became  familiar  with  slavery  in  its  best 
aspects,  as  well  as  in  some  of  its  worst.  Only  a 
woman  could  have  realized  all  its  horrors  ;  but  he 
felt  them  keenly  enough  to  be  able  to  make  their  in 
iquity  plain  to  his  hearers  ;  and  he  had  the  great  ad 
vantage  of  knowing  how  bad  the  system  was  in  its  best 
possible  form.  He  also  discovered  that  the  only  solid 
foundations  of  liberty  are  knowledge  and  courage. 
His  last  four  years  as  a  slave  were  made  unusually 
pleasant,  because  he  had  dared,  at  the  risk  of  the 
gallows,  to  fight  hand  to  hand  with  his  master  ;  and 
promotion,  from  a  field-hand  to  a  city  mechanic,  re 
warded  his  first  attempt  to  run  away.  He  taught  him 
self  to  read  and  write,  and  also  to  speak  effectively. 
His  residence  for  almost  three  years  at  New  Bedford 
showed  him  how  deeply  the  North  was  stained  with 
prejudices  which  would  not  let  him  enter  a  church 
on  equal  terms  with  white  worshipers,  and  which 
prevented  him  from  taking  up  the  trade  which  he 
had  followed  successfully  in  Baltimore.  In  spite  of 
393 


394  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

many  hardships,  he  realized  so  fully  the  superior 
advantages  of  working  in  free  competition  over  labor 
under  compulsion,  that  he  was  prepared  to  resist  all 
the  blandishments  of  socialism,  even  when  presented 
by  those  white  people  who  had  been  among  the  first 
to  recognize  his  rights.  His  joining  the  Garriso- 
nians  enabled  him  to  become  prominent  as  a  speaker 
much  earlier  than  would,  in  all  probability,  have  been 
the  case  if  he  had  preferred  the  voting  Abolition 
ists  ;  but  he  could  not  in  any  case  have  remained 
very  long  unknown  and  silent  in  Massachuestts. 
His  education  did  not  advance  as  rapidly  as  it  would 
have  done  if  he  had  not  been  obliged  to  be  his  own 
teacher,  for  the  most  part,  even  in  New  Bedford  ; 
but  this  isolation  had  some  compensation  in  his 
developing  unusual  capacity  for  thinking  for  himself. 
This  was  plain  during  the  second  period  of  his  life, 
which  began  with  his  ranking  himself  among  the 
Garrisonians,  in  August,  1841,  and  closed  with  his 
renouncing  disunionism  in  May,  1851.  All  these  years 
he  was  busy  as  a  lecturer  against  slavery,  and  espec 
ially  so  during  the  first  six.  His  first  exploit  was  in 
helping  his  people  gain  the  suffrage  in  Rhode  Island  ; 
and  he  next  took  part  in  that  agitation  against  the 
return  of  a  fugitive  named  Latimer,  which  has  em 
bodied  itself  permanently  in  our  literature,  in  Whit- 
tier's  magnificent  poem,  "  Massachusetts  to  Virginia." 
For  four  years  the  black  knight  roamed  to  and  fro, 
from  Maine  to  Indiana,  always  ready  to  break  a  lance 
with  any  champion  of  slavery.  Sometimes  he  had  to 
collect  his  audience  by  going  through  the  town,  ring 
ing  a  big  bell,  and  crying  the  meeting.  Or  else  he 
would  take  his  stand  under  a  tree,  or  at  the  corner  of 


CONCLUSION.  395 

a  side-street,  and  persuade  people  who  had  set  out 
for  church  to  stop  to  hear  him.  Once,  at  least,  he 
fought  for  his  life  against  an  armed  mob  ;  sometimes 
he  had  the  full  sympathy  of  thousands  of  eager  list 
eners  ;  and  sometimes  he  found  only  a  handful  of 
timid  adherents  in  the  almost  empty  hall.  Opposi 
tion  and  indifference  could  not  lessen  his  zeal,  but 
only  made  him  exert  more  eagerly  his  matchless 
power  of  pathos  mingled  with  ridicule.  His  parodies 
of  the  slave-holders'  cant  had  an  effect  which  is  not 
to  be  revived  by  merely  reprinting  the  words  ;  and  it 
is  impossible  to  do  any  justice  to  his  success  in  call 
ing  forth  tears  of  sympathy.  His  fiercest  denuncia 
tions  were  provoked  by  a  clerical  conservatism, 
largely  due  to  the  disunionism  represented  on  the 
banner  which  he  and  his  friends  formally  accepted, 
at  Boston,  in  1844,  and  carried  at  the  head  of  a  great 
procession  through  Hingham.  While  joining  eagerly 
in  this  agitation  for  a  dissolution  of  the  Union,  he 
resisted  the  attempt  of  some  leading  Garrisonians  to 
merge  abolitionism  in  socialism  ;  and  his  boldness  in 
defying  the  authority  of  his  superiors  kept  the  great 
reform  true  to  its  orignal  aim. 

His  devotion  to  it  made  him,  when  challenged  to 
prove  that  he  had  really  been  a  slave,  tell  the  place 
and  his  master's  name.  The  little  book  was  such  a 
great  success  that  he  could  not  be  safe  in  the  United 
States.  He  crossed  the  ocean  ;  and  found  that  the 
color-prejudice  was  only  an  Americanism.  Ireland 
gave  him  one  long  ovation.  He  was  at  war  for  a  year 
with  the  Scotch  clergy,  on  the  question,  whether  slave 
holders  ought  to  be  fellowshiped  ;  and  this  gave  him 
a  reputation  which  was  increased  by  a  single  combat 


396  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

in  London,  with  a  Doctor  of  Divinity  from  New  York. 
His  English  friends  would  have  kept  him  among 
them,  but  he  preferred  to  fight  in  the  forlorn  hope  ; 
and  so  they  bought  his  freedom.  He  was  also  enabled 
by  them  to  start  a  newspaper  ;  but  this  was  opposed 
by  Garrison,  and  postponed  for  six  months,  part  of 
which  were  spent  in  a  western  tour,  involving  some 
sharp  debates  with  men  who  appealed  to  the  ballot- 
box  against  slavery.  Before  the  close  of  1847,  Doug 
lass  made  up  his  mind  that  it  was  his  duty  to  publish 
the  "  North  Star  ;  "  and  he  took  up  his  residence  at 
Rochester,  for  there  was  much  hostility  in  Boston,  in 
spite  of  his  remaining  for  three  years  more,  loyal  to 
Garrisonianism.  He  continued  to  lecture,  though  not 
often  in  New  England  ;  but  his  main  strength  was 
given  to  the  paper,  which  showed  high  ability  and 
was  carried  on  for  twelve  years,  in  spite  of  occasional 
pecuniary  difficulties.  The  movement  in  behalf  of 
women  found  one  of  its  earliest  advocates  in  the  "  North 
Star;"  much  stress  was  laid  on  the  need  among  the 
blacks  of  industrial  training  ;  and  the  editor's  house 
soon  became  one  of  the  most  useful  stations  on  the 
Under-ground  Railroad. 

He  took  less  interest  than  many  other  colored  men 
in  the  organization  of  the  Free  Soil  party  ;  and  that 
same  year,  1848,  he  denounced  all  supporters  of  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  as  enemies  of  God 
and  man.  He  found  out  gradually  his  error,  as  he 
carried  on  controversies,  first  with  a  negro  clergyman 
named  Ward,  and  then  with  the  great  philanthropist, 
Gerrit  Smith.  Before  finally  casting  in  his  lot  with 
the  men  who  actually  abolished  slavery,  he  was  able 
to  quell  a  pro-slavery  riot  in  New  York,  with  Ward's 


CONCLUSION.  397 

help  ;  but  the  united  efforts  of  Phillips,  Garrison, 
Parker,  and  Douglass  could  not  prevent  Faneuil 
Hall  from  being  taken  from  them  by  a  noisy 
mob,  soon  after  the  passage  of  the  Fugitive  Slave 
Bill  in  1850. 

Our  hero's  life  thus  far  is  told  in  six  chapters  :  and 
five  more  are  given  to  the  fourteen  years,  ending 
with  the  complete  conquest  of  slavery  in  1865.  This 
third  period  is  by  far  the  most  important  in  the  light 
of  history;  for  Douglass  was  now  working  in  har 
mony  with  Sumner,  Wilson,  Chase,  Seward,  Lincoln, 
and  other  leaders  of  the  party  which  actually  freed 
the  slaves.  His  devotion  to  the  cause  of  his  race 
was  as  pure  and  lofty  as  ever  ;  and  he  met  the  hostil 
ity  of  the  disunionist  Abolitionists,  by  saying:  "  I 
would  unite  with  anybody  to  do  right,  and  with  no 
body  to  do  wrong."  ...  "I  love  and  honor  William 
Lloyd  Garrison,"  .  .  .  and  "  have  not  the  slightest 
wish  to  be  embroiled  in  personal  controversy  with 
anti-slavery  men  of  any  sort."  His  reception  by  the 
Free  Soilers,  in  the  convention  of  1852,  was  enthusi 
astic  ;  but  the  people  of  Rochester  forced  him  to  live 
year  after  year  among  them  like  a  hermit  ;  and  ten 
years  went  by  without  his  revisiting  Boston.  Ohio 
and  Illinois  were  more  hospitable  than  Massachusetts, 
and  listened  to  him  eagerly,  when  the  attempt  to  en 
slave  Kansas  excited  such  indignation  in  the  North 
as  suddenly  transformed  what  had  hitherto  seemed 
only  an  insignificant  faction  into  a  mighty  party. 
His  newspaper  went  on  under  a  new  name  until  it 
was  merged  in  a  "  Monthly,"  which  lasted  almost  to  the 
end  of  the  war.  He  also  published  a  number  of 
pamphlets  at  this  period  ;  his  Autobiography  as- 


398  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

sumed  a  new  and  highly  interesting  form  ;  and  he 
began  to  write  out  his  lectures  before  delivery.  His 
style  had  always  been  powerful,  as  well  as  pictur 
esque;  and  it  was  now  liable  to  little  criticism,  except 
on  account  of  repetitions.  His  mastery  of  English 
was  complete,  in  spite  of  lack  of  knowledge  of  other 
languages,  or  perhaps  in  consequence  of  concentra 
tion  upon  one  vocabulary. 

The  intimacy  which  he  had  formed,  while  still  a 
disunionist,  with  John  Brown,  continued  until  it  was 
broken  off  by  a  refusal  to  go  to  Harper's  Ferry  ;  and 
discovery  of  the  correspondence  obliged  Douglass  to 
make  a  brief  visit  to  England,  where  he  did  much  to 
dispel  the  prejudices  of  Abolitionists  against  our  Con 
stitution.  The  indignities  inflicted  on  him  in  Boston 
and  Albany  by  mobs  of  would-be  savers  of  the  Union, 
did  not  hinder  him  from  taking  sides  with  the  Gov 
ernment  as  soon  as  war  broke  out  ;  and  he  published 
a  pathetic  Appeal  to  Great  Britain,  against  recogni 
tion  of  the  Confederacy.  Freely  as  he  blamed  Lin 
coln's  tardiness, .he  was  among  the  warmest  admirers 
of  the  proclamations  of  emancipation  ;  and  the  plan 
of  raising  colored  regiments  was  enthusiastically  sup 
ported,  in  spite  of  occasional  complaints  that  it  was 
not  carried  out  in  good  faith.  His  personal  relations 
with  our  great  President  were  friendly,  and  this 
enabled  him  to  break  through  the  exclusiveness  which 
had  hitherto  stained  the  White  House.  The  energy 
with  which  he  supported  the  war  from  the  first,  was 
kept  up  until  he  was  able  to  tell  a  delighted  audi 
ence,  in  Faneuil  Hall,  that  the  parable  of  Dives  and 
Lazarus  was  all  true.  The  rich  man  of  the  South 
was  in  torments,  and  calling  out  in  vain  for  the  send- 


CONCLUSION.  399 

ing   back  of   Lazarus,  who  was  safe  in   Abraham's 
bosom. 

The  twenty-five  years  since  April  1865,  occupy  but 
three  chapters  ;  for  this  last  period  is  by  no  means  so 
rich  as  its  predecessor  in  great  events.  It  has  been 
one  of  those  happy  times,  when  but  little  takes  place 
which  is  intensely  interesting ;  and  Douglass  has  had 
little  chance  to  make  history,  though  he  has  done 
much  to  make  presidents.  It  is  largely  due  to  him 
that  the  freedmen  secured  the  ballot  and  gave  it 
faithfully  to  the  Republican  party  ;  and  their  dis- 
franchisement  has  called  out  his  earnest  but  not  very 
successful  protests.  The  questions  about  the  annex 
ation  of  San  Domingo,  and  the  exposure  of  the 
Freedman's  Bank,  have  already  ceased  to  be  important; 
his  services  as  Marshal  and  Recorder  belong,  like  his 
reconciliation  with  his  dying  master,  his  last  book,  and 
his  journey  to  Europe,  to  biography,  not  history  ;  and 
the  negro  exodus  of  1879  would  have  little  interest,  if 
there  were  not  some  danger  of  a  second  edition.  His 
denunciations  of  the  store-order  fraud,  lynching,  sale 
of  convict  labor,  and  other  wrongs  upon  the  Southern 
negro,  ought  not  to  be  forgotten  until  all  such  abuses 
are  abolished  ;  but  his  most  valuable  suggestion  is 
that  the  white  men  of  the  South  cannot  afford,  for 
their  own  sakes,  to  let  fraud  and  violence  continue 
unpunished  ;  and  that  the  need  of  attracting  capital 
and  immigration  will  yet  teach  justice  and  humanity. 
It  is  by  no  means  certain  that  his  mission  to  Hayti 
will  do  more  good  than  his  constant  advice  to  his 
brethren  to  give  their  children  trades,  to  practice  in 
dustry,  and  to  avoid  all  extravagance,  even  in  re 
ligion. 


400  FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

His  whole  life  from  first  to  last  is  heroic,  in  his 
steady  determination  to  think  for  himself,  and  to 
speak  what  he  thinks  at  any  risk.  His  mistakes  have 
been  only  errors  in  judgment ;  he  has  never  been 
false  to  principle  ;  and  his  mighty  eloquence  has 
poured  forth  freely  in  defense,  not  only  of  his  own 
oppressed  race,  but  of  the  disfranchised  sex,  of  down 
trodden  Ireland,  of  the  maltreated  Chinese,  and  of 
dumb  animals.  Never  has  he  called  out  tears,  except 
for  those  who  deserve  pity,  nor  tried  to  make  the  poor 
and  suffering  appear  ridiculous.  His  ability  to  rec 
ognize  real  reforms  may  not  be  as  keen  now  as  for 
merly  ;  but  he  has  never  been  deluded  by  visionary 
ones.  After  more  than  seventy  years  of  trial  and  re 
sponsibility  he  is  still  hopeful  and  happy  as  a  boy, 
and  almost  as  active.  Quickness  of  brain,  kindness 
of  heart,  and  richness  of  imagination  characterize  his 
familiar  talk,  as  well  as  his  speeches  and  books  ;  and 
there  are  very  few  men  whose  conversation  is  so  free 
from  vulgarity  or  irritability,  and  so  perfectly  refined 
without  any  stiffness,  dulness,  or  constraint.  He  is  a 
gentleman  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  word  ;  and  it  is 
very  seldom  that  it  can  be  applied  so  justly.  The 
man  is  greater  than  the  speeches  and  books. 

We  must  not,  however,  forget  his  literary  skill  in 
planting  himself  upon  the  strongest  and  highest 
ground,  in  retaining  the  attention  of  the  reader,  and 
in  putting  his  thoughts  into  brilliant  sentences  like 
several  which  have  been  chosen  as  headings  for  chap 
ters,  and  also  like  the  following  : 

"  All  true  reforms  are  kindred."  "  There  is  no  polish  with 
out  friction."  "  Speech  is  the  lever  that  moves  the  world." 
"  Enforced  morality  is  artificial  morality."  "  A  difference  of 


CONCLUSION.  401 

opinion,  like  a  discord  in  music,  sometimes  gives  the  highest 
effects  of  harmony."  "  The  limits  of  tyrants  are  prescribed  by 
the  endurance  of  those  whom  they  oppress."  "  Men  may  not 
get  all  they  pay  for  in  this  world,  but  they  must  certainly  pay 
for  all  they  get."  "  It  is  always  a  dangerous  symptom,  when 
men  pray  to  know  what  is  their  duty."  "  Truth  is  never  un 
called  for."  "  Human  government  is  for  the  protection  of 
rights,  and  not  for  the  destruction  of  rights."  "  The  bind 
ing  quality  of  law  is  its  reasonableness."  "  The  world 
moves,  but  only  by  fighting  every  inch  of  its  disputed  way. " 
"  Men  are  whipped  oftenest  who  are  whipped  easiest."  "  I 
know  of  no  rights  of  race  superior  to  the  rights  of  humanity." 
"The  true  basis  of  rights  is  the  capacity  of  individuals." 
"  Person  is  at  least  as  sacred  as  its  incident,  property."  "  What 
we  call  money  is  only  stored  labor."  "  It  may  be  with  men 
as  some  one  has  said  about  tea :  if  you  wish  to  get  its  strength 
you  must  put  it  into  hot  water." 


APPENDIX. 


LIST    OF    PUBLICATIONS    BY    FREDERICK    DOUGLASS. 

Letters  in  the  "  Liberator,"  1842-7  and  1859. 

"  Narrative  of  the  Life  of  Frederick  Douglass,  an  American 
Slave,  Written  by  Himself,"  Boston,  1845.  (Various  Editions 
afterward.) 

"  Correspondence  between  Samuel  H.  Cox  and  Frederick 
Douglass,"  New  York,  1846. 

Speech  at  Soiree  at  London  Tavern,  March  30,  1847,  in 
"  Report  of  Proceedings,"  London,  1847. 

"The  North  Star,  "  Rochester,  1847-50. 

"  Vie  de  Frederic  Douglass,  Traduite  par  S.  K.  Parkes," 
Paris,  Pagnerre,  1848. 

"  Letter  to  Thomas  Auld,"  1848. 

"  Lectures  on  American  Slavery,  Delivered  at  Corinthian 
Hall,  Rochester,"  Buffalo,  1851. 

"  Frederick  Douglass's  Paper,"  Rochester,  1850-60. 

"  The  Heroic  Slave,"  in  "  Autographs  for  Freedom,"  1852  or 

1853. 

Extract  from  a  Speech  made  at  New  York,  May,  1853,  in 
"  Autographs  for  Freedom,"  1854. 

"  The  Claims  of  the  Negro,  Ethnologically  Considered,  an 
Address  at  Western  Reserve  College,"  Rochester,  1854. 

"My  Bondage  and  My  Freedom.  Part  I,  Life  as  a  Slave; 
Part  II,  Life  as  a  Freeman,"  New  York  and  Auburn,  1855. 

"  The  Anti-Slavery  Movement,  a  Lecture  before  the  Roch 
ester  Ladies' Anti-Slavery  Society."  Rochester  Daily  American 
Office,  1855. 

"  Two  Speeches,  one  on  West  India  Emancipation  and  the 
402 


APPENDIX.  403 

other  on  the  Dred  Scott  Decision,"  Rochester,  American 
Office,  1857. 

"  Douglass's  Monthly,"  Rochester,  i858-64.(?) 

"  Eulogy  of  the  late  Hon.  Wm.  Jay,"  Rochester,  1859. 

"  Sclaverei  und  Freiheit.  Autobiographic  von  Frederick 
Douglass.  Uebersetzung  von  Ottilie  Assing,"  Hamburg,  1860. 

"  The  Slave's  Appeal  to  Great  Britain,"  1862. 

"  What  Shall  be  Done  With  Four  Million  Slaves,  if  they  are 
Emancipated  ?  "  Essay  quoted  in  "  The  Black  Man,  his  Ante 
cedents,  his  Genius,  and  his  Achievements,"  by  W.  W.  Brown, 
1863. 

"  Men  of  Color  to  Arms,"  1863. 

"  Speech  before  the  American  Anti-Slavery  Society,  at  its 
Third  Decade,  New  York,  1864. 

Lecture  at  Dedication  of  the  Douglass  Institute,  Baltimore, 
in  the  "  Liberator,"  for  October  13,  1865. 

Reply  to  President  Johnson,  1866,  also  in  "  Life  and  Times," 
1882. 

"The  New  National  Era,"  1869-72. 

Address  at  Arlington,  on  Decoration  Day,  1871,  also  in 
"  Life  and  Times,"  1882. 

"  Oration  at  the  Unveiling  of  the  Freedmen's  Monument  to 
Abraham  Lincoln,"  Washington,  1876,  also  in  "Life  and 
Times,"  1882. 

Letter  in  the  "Washington  Evening  Star,"  1877,  also  in 
"  Life  and  Times,"  1882. 

Address  on  Decoration  Day  in  New  York,  1878. 

"  The  Negro  Exodus  from  the  Gulf  States,"  in  "  Journal  of 
Social  Science,"  No.  XI,  May,  1880,  also  in  "  Life  and  Times," 
1882. 

"  The  Color-line,"  in  the  "  North  American  Review,"  April, 
iSSi. 

Addresses  at  Elmira,  August  i ,  1 880,  on  "  West  India  Eman 
cipation,"  and  at  Washington,  September  26,  1881,  on  "  Gar- 
field,"  in  "  Life  and  Times,"  1882. 

"  Life  and  Times  of  Frederick  Douglass,  Written  by  Himself," 
Hartford,  Conn.,  Park  Publishing  Co.,  1882. 


404  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

Speech  at  the  Civil  Rights  Mass-meeting,  October  22,  1883, 
Washington,  C.  P.  Farrell,  1883. 

"  The  Freedmen,"  in  "  Harper's  Weekly,"  December  8,  1883. 

"  The  Future  of  the  Negro,"  in  the  "  North  American 
Review,"  July,  1884. 

Address  on  Wendell  Phillips,  in  "  Life  and  Times  of  Wendell 
Phillips,"  by  G.  L.  Austin,  Boston,  1884. 

"  Three  Addresses  on  the  Relations  Subsisting  Between  the 
White  and  Colored  People  of  the  United  States,"  delivered 
September  24,  1883,  April  16, 1885,  April  16, 1886,  Washington, 
Gibson  Bros.,  1886. 

"  The  Future  of  the  Colored  Race,"  in  the  "  North  American 
Review  "  for  April,  1886. 

"  Speech  on  the  Seventy-ninth  Anniversary  of  the  Birth  of 
Lincoln,"  Washington,  Gibson  Bros.,  1888. 

Speech  at  the  International  Council  of  Women  in  Washington, 
in  the  "  Woman's  Journal, "April  14,  1888. 

Speech  before  the  N.  E.  Woman  Suffrage  Association,  in  the 
"  Woman's  Journal,"  June  2,  1888. 

"  The  Nation's  Problem,"  a  Speech  delivered  on  April  16, 
1889. 

"  Reminiscences,"  in  the  "  Cosmopolitan  "  for  August,  1889. 

Among  lectures  and  speeches  which  were,  perhaps  without 
exception,  reported  more  or  less  fully  at  the  time  of  delivery, 
and  which  may  in  some  cases  have  been  published  in  pamphlet 
form,  are  the  following  : 

Speech  at  Plymouth  County  Convention,  Hingham,  Novem 
ber  4,  1841. 

Speech  on  Dorr  Constitution  at  Providence,  December,  1841. 

Speeches  against  the  Liberty  Party,  before  M.  A.  S.  S.,  Bos 
ton,  January  26  and  27,  1842. 

Speeches  at  Latimer  Meetings,  New  Bedford,  November  6, 
1842. 

Disumonist  Speech,  before  M.  A.  A.  S.,  Boston,  January  27, 
1843. 

Lecture  on '-  Slavery  as  Actually  Existing  in  the  South,"  Bos 
ton,  March  6,  1843. 


APPENDIX.  405 

Speech  before  A.  A.  S.  S.,  New  York,  May  10,  1843. 
Speech  before  M.  A.  S.  S.,  Boston,  January  24,  1844. 
Speech  at  Hingham,  August  2,  1844. 
Speech  against  Annexation  of  Texas,  Boston,  January  26, 

1845- 

Speech  in  New  York,  May  8,  1845. 

Speech  before  New  England  Convention,  Boston,  May,  1845. 

Speech  at  Repeal  Meeting,  Dublin,  September,  1845. 

Speech  in  Glasgow,  April  21,  1846. 

Addresses  in  London  on  Slavery,  May  18,  on  Peace,  May  10, 
on  Manhood  Suffrage,  May  20,  on  Temperance,  May  21,  and  at 
the  Douglass  Reception,  May  22,  1846. 

Speech  at  World's  Temperance  Convention,  London,  Au 
gust  7,  1846. 

Speech  before  Anti-Slavery  League,  London,  September  14, 
1846. 

Speech  before  A.  A.  S.  S.,  New  York,  May,  1847. 

Speech  before  Western  Anti-Slavery  Society,  New  Lyme,  O., 
August  1 8,  1847. 

Speech  at  Oberlin,  O.,  August,  1847. 

Speech  before  A.  A.  S.  S.,  New  York,  May  9,  1848. 

Address  on  Industrial  Education  at  the  Colored  Conven 
tion,  Cleveland,  O.,  September,  1848. 

Address  before  A.  A.  S.  S.,  New  York,  May  9,  1849. 

Defense  of  A.  A.  S.  S.,  against  a  mob,  New  York,  May  7, 
1850. 

Attack  on  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  Boston,  October  14,  1850. 

Speech  at  Cincinnati,  May  5,  1852. 

Debate  with  Garrisonians  in  A.  A.  S.  S.  Convention, Roches 
ter,  N,  Y.,  May  12,  1852. 

Fourth  of  July  Oration,  Rochester,  1852. 

Address  to  the  Free  Soil  Convention,  August  11,  1852. 

Kansas  Speech,  in  Chicago,  September,  1854. 

Address  to  the  Legislature,  at  Albany,  March,  1855. 

Lecture   on  "  Self-made  Men." 

"  The  Constitution  of  the  United  States :  is  it  Pro-slavery,  or 
Anti-slavery  ?  "  Glasgow,  March  26,  1860. 


406  FREDERICK  DOUGLASS. 

War  speeches,  Rochester,  April  27,  1861,  and  often  after 
ward. 

Lecture  on  "  The  Rebellion,  its  Cause  and  its  Remedy," 
Syracuse,  November  14,  1861. 

Lecture  in  behalf  of  the  Emancipation  League,  Boston,  1862. 

Protest  against  Sending  Negroes  back  to  Africa,  Cooper 
Institute,  New  York,  February  12,  1862. 

Fourth  of  July  Oration,  at  Himrod's  Corners,  N.  Y.,  1862. 

Emancipation  Speech  in  Boston,  January  I,  1863. 

Address  Urging  Colored  Men  to  Enlist,  Philadelphia,  June 
17,  1863. 

Lecture  on  "The  Mission  of  the  War,"  Boston,  February  10, 
1864. 

Lecture  on  "  William  the  Silent." 

Lecture  on  "  The  Composite  Nation,"  Parker  Fraternity 
Course,  Boston,  1867. 

Address  at  Watkin's  Glen,  N.  Y.,  August  i,  1867. 

Lecture  on  "  Santo  Domingo." 

Address  to  Convention  of  Colored  Citizens  at  New  Orleans, 
April,  1872. 

Campaign  Speeches  during  this  and  other  Presidential  Con 
tests. 

Lecture  on  "John  Brown,"  Charlestown,  Mass.,  December  9, 

1873- 

Speech  at  Woman  Suffrage  Meeting,  Faneuil  Hall,  Boston, 
December  15,  1873. 

Decoration  Day  Address,  Rochester  N.  Y. 

Lecture  entitled  "  It  Moves." 

Speech  at  Centennial  of  the  Abolition  Society  of  Pennsyl 
vania,  1875. 

Fourth  of  July  Oration  at  Hillsdale,  1875. 

Address  at  Pinchback  Mass-meeting,  Washington,  March, 
1876. 

Lecture  on  "  Our  National  Capital,"  Washington,  1876,  and 
Baltimore,  1877. 

Speech  on  the  Death  of  Garrison,  Washington,  June  2,  1879. 

Address  at  Colored  Convention,  Louisville,  July,  1880. 


APPENDIX. 


407 


Campaign  Address  at  Rochester,  August  4,  1880. 

Speech  to  Conkling  Club,  Washington,  February,  1881. 

Speech  on  Twentieth  Anniversary  of  Emancipation  Procla 
mation,  Washington,  January  i,  1883. 

Address  on  Twenty-first    Anniversary  of    Emancipation  in 
the  District  of  Columbia,  April  16,  1883. 

Elaine  Speech  at  Syracuse,  October  i,  1884. 

"  Thoughts  and  Recollections  of  the  Anti-Slavery  Conflict," 
a  Lecture. 

Address  at    Dedication  of   Hunter  Memorial,  Washington, 
February,    1886. 

Speech  at  Dinner  of  Massachusetts  Club,  Boston,  May  22, 
1886. 

Woman  Suffrage  Address,  Boston,  May  24,  1886. 

Speech  at  Dinner  of  Wendell  Phillips  Club,  Boston,  Septem 
ber  11,  1886. 

Two  Lectures  on   his   Trip  to   Europe  and   Egypt,  one  of 
which  is  entitled,  "  Paris,  Rome,  and  Cairo." 

Address  on  Relations  of  White  and  Colored  People,  deliv 
ered  at  Washington,  April  16,  1888. 

Speech  on  the  Issues  of  the  Presidential  Election,  1888. 

Address  to  the  Colored  Citizens  of  the  United  States,  1888. 

Two   Speeches   at   Abolitionist   Reunion,   Boston,   Septem 
ber  22,  1890. 

Address  before  Bethel  Association,  Washington,  October  21, 
1890. 


INDEX. 


Abolitionism,  its  Condition  in  1840,  44-55,  and  in  1852,  230. 

Abolitionist  Reunions,  306,  383,  390. 

Abolitionists,  16,  44-56,  70,  79,  87,  89,  98,  100,  172,  181,  190- 

193,  205,  230,  246,  247,  275-283,  362,  363,  390. 
Adams,  Hon.  C.  F.,  77,  174,  187. 
Adams,  President  J.  O.,  75,  98. 
Africa,  Return  of  Negroes  to,  286,  316,  368. 
"Alicia,"  The,  180. 

Amendments  to  the  Constitution,  195,  313,  316-319,  333,  353,  378. 
American  Anti-Slavery  Society,  46,  48,  50,  51,  70,  79,  151-153, 

167-169,  177,  181-185,  191-194,  214,  246,  248,  279,  303,  313. 
Anarchism,  49,  50,  108,  109,  272. 
Andersen,  Hans  Christian,  137,  167. 
Andrew,  Governor,  283,  297,  299,  307,  343. 
"  Anti-Slavery  Conflict,  Recollections  of  the,"  43,  83,  84. 
"Anti-Slavery  Movement,  The,"  191-194,  248,  249. 
Arthur,  President,  357,  359. 
Assing,  Miss  Ottilia,  250,  261,  275. 
Attucks,  Crispus,  373. 

'Auld,  Hugh,  15,  17,  29,  30,  33,  133,  138,  141,  153. 
Auld,  Mrs.  Lucretia,  13,  14,  17,  318. 
Auld,  Mrs.  Sophia,  14. 
Auld,  Thomas,  14-28,  125-127,  242,  343. 
"  Autographs  for  Freedom,"  181,  216,  220. 
Avignon,  364. 
409 


410  INDEX. 

Bailey,  Original  name  of  Frederick  Douglass,  8,  34-36. 

Bailey,  Perry,  8,  320. 

Ballot,  vide  Negro  Suffrage  and  Woman  Suffrage. 

Baltimore,  14,  28-32,  42,  45,  314. 

Banks,  Hon.  N.  P.,  373. 

"  Barnburners,"  172,  173. 

Beecher,  Rev.  Dr.  Lyman,  135. 

Beecher,  Rev.  H.  W.,  214,  256,  284,  289. 

Bellamy,  Edward,  88. 

Bethel  Literary  and  Historical  Association,  335,  374,  392. 

Bible,  The,  14,  15,  16,  43,  48,  54,  89,  118,  no.,  136,  177,  339. 

Birney,  Hon.  J.  G.,  47,  50,  51,  56,  98,  202. 

Elaine,  Hon.  J.  G.,  355. 

Boston,  45,  46,  66,  98,  100,  107,  108,  124,  187-189,  275,280-285, 

307,  390. 

"  Boston  Post,"  The,  151,  382. 
Bowditch,  Dr.  H.  I.,  66,  77,  363. 
Bowring,  Sir  John,  137. 
Bradburn,  George,  57,  92,  96,  108. 
Bremer,  Frederika,  226. 
Bright,  John,  128,  146. 
Brougham,  Lord,  127,  144. 
Brown,  "  Box,"  32. 
Brown,  John,  186,  225,  233,  247,  248,  262-277,  280-284,  298, 

307,  308,  329,  350. 
Bryant,  Wm.  C,  174. 
Buchanan,  President,  182,  250,  275. 
Buffalo,  92-4,  173-175,  201,  249. 
Buffum,  J.  N.,  82,  112,  1 16,  1 22,  363. 
Burleigh,  C.  C.,  53,  100,  185,  202. 
Butler,  B.  F.,  253,  265,  318,  332. 

"Cambria,"  The,  112-114,  145-147. 
Campbell,  Thomas,  226,  229. 
Capital  Punishment,  222. 
Cass,  General,  172,  235. 


4 

Cedar  Hill,  in,  12,  37,  347,  348. 

Chalmers,  Rev.  Dr.  Thomas,  121. 

Charming,  Rev.  Dr.  \V.  E.,  38,  55,  205. 

Channing,  Rev.  W.  H.,  221,  226. 

Chapman,  Mrs.  M.  W.,  49,  53,  89,  165. 

Charleston,  S.  C,  367. 

Chartists,  128,  130. 

Chase,  Salmon  P.,  174,  178,  349. 

Cheever,  Rev.  Dr.  George  B.,  269. 

Chicago,  233-239. 

Child,  Mrs.  L.  M.,  49,  53,  100,  272. 

Chinese,  245,  320-323. 

Christianity,  vide  Douglass,  Religious  Views  of,  also  Slavery 
and  the  Church. 

Cincinnati,  47,  202. 

Civil  Rights  Bill,  332,  353-355.  361,  371,  378, 

Civil  Service  Reform,  147,  172. 

Clarke,  Rev.  Dr.  J.  F.,  74,  101,  284. 

Cleveland,  O.,  160-164,  175. 

Cleveland,  President,  356,  357,  372,  376. 

Clifford,  Governor,  39,  84. 
Collins,  John  A.,  59,  71,  87-90. 
Colman,  Mrs.  Lucy  N.,  221-224. 
Colored  Troops,  285,  287,  296-305. 

Color  Prejudice,  28,  36,  39-42,  46,  66,  69,  71-76,  81-84,  96,  97, 
no,  112,  120,  134,  142-147,  155-157,  176,  177,    180,  182-185! 
203,  210,  211,  215,  223-229,  237,  248,  260,  268,  296,  305,  310, 
314-321,  342,  348-355,  364,  379,  382,  390. 
"  Columbian  Orator,"  The,  15,  26. 
"  Composite  Nation,  The."  320-323. 
"Conciliation  Hall,"  118. 
Concord,  Mass.,  101,  331. 
Concord,  N.  H.,  63,  72,  85,  109. 
Conkling,  Hon.  Roscoe,  332,341,  349,  371. 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  Anti-Slavery,  193-197,  199, 
201,  207,  208,  237,  248,  257-259,  277,  281,  286,  295,  296. 


412  INDEX. 

Copper-heads,  307,  319. 

"  Cosmopolitan,"  The,  374. 

Covey,  Edward,  19-25,  44,  106,  126. 

Cox,  Rev.  Dr.  S.  H.,  134,  141. 

Craft,  William,  187,  265. 

Cunard  Company,  The,  145,  146. 

Dallas,  George  M.,  277. 

Davis,  Jefferson,  319. 

Democrats,  61,  70,  95,  130,  158,  167,  172,  173, 181,231,  275,284, 
316,  319,  325,  344,  359,  371. 

Dickens,  Charles,  166,  185. 

Dickinson,  Miss  Anna  E.,  294,  300,  383,  388. 

Disunionism,  48,  49,  60,  66-70,  78,  97-101,109,  122,  141,  153, 
158,  160,  167-169,  174,  175,  177-180,  189-201,  204,  246,  280, 
284,  289. 

Dives  and  Lazarus,  311. 

Dorr,  T.  W.,  61,65. 

Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  232-240. 

Douglass,  Anna  F.,  36,  225,  226,  277. 

Douglass,  Charles  F.,  36,  297,  299. 

Douglass,  Frederick,  born  in  Slavery,  7 — Brought  up  on  a  plan 
tation,  9 — Teaches  himself  to  read,  14 — Suffers  cruelty,  21 — 
Resists,  24 — Attempts  to  escape,  26 — Learns  a  trade,  28 — 
Escapes,  32 — Marries  and  goes  to  New  Bedford,  36 — Takes 
the  name  of  Douglass,  37 — Becomes  an  Abolitionist  lecturer, 
57 — Writes  for  the  "Liberator,"  75 — Removes  to  Lynn,  77 
— Resists  insult  on  the  Eastern  R.  R.,  81 — Fights  against 
a  mob  in  Indiana,  96 — Publishes  the  narrative  of  his  life,  102 
— Visits  Ireland,  115 — Scotland,  121 — London,  130 — Emanci 
pated,  138 — Returns  from  Europe,  147 — Out  West  with  Gar 
rison,  154 — Edits  the  "North  Star"  at  Rochester,  161 — 
Helps  start  the  Woman  Suffrage  reform,  169 — Advocates 
industrial  education,  175 — Quells  a  mob  in  New  York,  181 — 
Leaves  the  disunionists,  190 — Changes  the  name  of  his  paper, 
202 — Speaks  at  the  Free  Soil  Convention  in  1852,  210 — Pub- 


INDEX.  413 

lishes  a  tale,  220 — Pleads  for  Kansas,  235 — Begins  to  write 
his  lectures,  240 — Publishes  "  My  Bondage  and  My  Free 
dom,"  241 — Denounces  Dred  Scott  decision,  257 — Publishes 
"  Douglass's  Monthly,"  261 — Confers  with  John  Brown,  262 
— Revisits  Great  Britain,  276 — Helps  elect  Lincoln,  280 — 
Mobbed  in  Boston,  280 — Supports  the  war,  284 — Opposes 
plans  for  sending  colored  people  to  Africa,  286 — Appeals  to 
public  opinion  in  Great  Britain,  289 — Welcomes  emancipa 
tion,  294 — Urges  colored  men  to  enlist,  297 — Talks  with 
Lincoln,  303 — Supports  him  for  re-election,  308 — Opposes 
Johnson's  policy,  315 — Attends  the  National  Loyalists  Con 
vention,  317 — Defends  the  Chinese,  320 — Edits  the  "New 
National  Era  "  at  Washington,  324 — Sent  to  San  Domingo, 
325 — Appointed  District  Councillor,  325 — Supports  Grant 
against  Greeley,  325 — Exposes  Freedman's  Bank,  328 — 
Lectures  on  Washington  City,  339 — Appointed  Marshal, 
341 — Reconciled  to  his  former  master,  343 — Speaks  in 
memory  of  Garrison,  343 — Opposes  negro  exodus,  345 — 
Visits  Florida,  348 — Appointed  Recorder,  350 — Revisits  the 
old  plantation,  350 — Presides  at  Garfield  memorial  meeting, 
350 — Publishes  his  "  Life  and  Times,"  350 — Marries  again, 
355 — Supports  Elaine  against  Cleveland,  355 — Resigns  his 
office,  356 — Travels  in  France  and  Egypt,  363 — Speaks  on 
wrongs  of  Freedmen,  368 — Supports  Harrison  against  Cleve 
land,  371 — Accepts  the  mission  to  Hayti,  383 — Tells  how  he 
was  received  there,  385 — Speaks  at  Abolitionist  Reunion, 
390 — Returns  to  Hayti,  392 — Busts  of,  137,  229,  343 — Ora 
tory  described,  60,  64,  71,  81,  82,  85,  95,  101,  160,  219,  220, 
223,  224,  225,  250,  261,  311,  312,  390,  395 — Religious  views, 
12,  16,  26,  30,  34,  40-42,  67,  76,  98,  100,  104-106,  118,  119, 
131-132,  160,  166,  177,  203,  208-210,  218,  219,  228,  241,  242, 
252,  256-258,  269,  306,  327,  333-339,  390-392 — Speeches,  in, 
57-58,60,85,93,108,113,  117-119,  122,  123,  130-137,  141- 
145,  153,  158,  167-170,  182,  183,  189,  191-199,  205,  207-218, 
233-239»  242,  268,  277-289,  303-311,  318-329,  331-332,  338- 
341,  343,  345,  348-356,  360-379,  389— Waitings,  III,  41,  43*  57, 


4  M  INDEX. 

75,   83,   98,  102,  112-116,  119,  124-127,  133-135,    138,    145, 

152,  153,  165-167,  171,  191-194,    202,    205,     206,    2I4-2I6,   220,      | 
221,240-255,257-262,266,    268-271,     279,    280,    285-294,    301, 

303.  306,  313-316,  324,  333-379.  383-389,  39Mo7. 
Douglass,  Frederick,  Jr.,  iv,  36,  267,  328. 
Douglass  Hall,  314,  341. 
Douglass,  Lewis  H.,  36,  275,  298,  315. 
Douglass  Light  Infantry,  367. 

Douglass,  Mrs.  Anna,  30,  36,  206,  223,  226,  280,  351. 
Douglass,  Rosetta,  36,  176,  225,  226,  279,  280. 
"  Douglass's  Monthly,"  261,  262,  269,  280,  284,  285,  326. 
Dred  Scott  Decision,  257-260,  278. 
Dublin,  115,  116. 

Easter,  27,  146. 

Eastern  R.  R.,  81-83. 

Easton,  Md.,  27,  350. 

Edinburgh,  123,  139. 

Education,  Industrial,  175,  220,  221,  247,  248,  382. 

Egypt,  241,365. 

Emancipation  in  the  District  of  Columbia,   16,  66,  268,  278, 

289,  352,  356. 
Emancipation  in  the  West  Indies,  101,   130,  260,  269,277,  290, 

294,  318,  348. 

Emancipation  League,  285,  299. 

Emancipation  Proclamations,  289-295,  306,  320,  352,  383. 
Emerson,  R.  W.,  55,  101,  167,  216,  275,  283. 
Ethnology,  Lecture  on,  240. 
Evangelical  Alliance,  135-137. 
Evolutionism,  335. 
Exodus,  the  Negro,  245,  286,  343-347,  368. 

Fillmore,  President,  250. 

Florence,  Mass.,  334. 

Folsom,  Mrs.  Abby,  53,  75,  108,  188. 

Foster,  S.  S.,  49,  54,  62,  98,  158-161,  204,  278,  313. 

Fourierism,  88. 


INDEX. 


415 


France,  277,  363. 

"  Frederick  Douglass's  Paper,"  202,  205,  206,  220,  221,  262,  326. 

Free  Church  of  Scotland,  121-124,  144,  147. 

Freedman'sBank,  328,  329,  353. 

Freedmen's  Wrongs,  344,  352-354,  368-372,  377,  378,  392. 

Free  Labor,  37,  90,  213. 

Free  Religious  Association,  334,  338. 

.  Free  Soilers,  50,  172-175,  199,  201,  210-213,  231-233,  249. 
f  Free  Trade,  33,  128-130,  147,  363,  372. 

Fremont,  John  C.,  233,  249,  250,  308, 

Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  74-78,  112,  118,  181,  185-188,  195,200, 
211-213,  218,  231,  232,  233,  246,  249,  250,  258,  278,  281. 

Furness,  Rev.  Dr.  Wm.  H.,  182,  374. 

Galileo,  335,  366. 

Garfield,  President,  329,  342,  348,  350. 
Garnett,  Rev.  Dr.  H.  H.,  44,  94,  260,  349. 
Garrisonians,  51-54,70,  89,  98,  100,  109,  in,  130, 173,  174,  178, 
181,  190-193,  198-200,  222,  231,  245,  260,  278,  286,  289,  299, 

313.  39^  394- 

Garrison,  Wm.  L.,  Ill,  43,  45,  46,  48-53,  57-59,  66,  70,  78,  100, 
102,  103,  115,  129,  133,  136-141,  150-152,  154-165,  182, 
188,  191-193,  198,  200,  204-206,  214,  222,  242-245,  250, 
267,  272,  278,  284,  295,  296,  307,  313,  343,  363,  391. 

Germans  in  America,  322. 

Giddings,  Hon.  J.  R.,  95,  158,  174,  178,  278. 

Gladstone,  Wm.  E.,  363. 

Glasgow,  .121,  123,124,277. 

Grant,  President,  311,  323-329,  340. 

"  Great  Britain,  The  Slave's  Appeal  to,"  290. 

Greeley,  Horace,  88,  183,  254,  285,  319,  326. 

Green,  Shields,  270,  271,  298. 

Griffiths,  Miss  Julia,  180,  181,  216,  262. 
J  Grimke,  A.  H.,  382. 

Grimke,  Miss  Angelina,  52,  169. 
I  Grimke,  Miss  Sarah,  52,  53,  169. 


4l6  INDEX. 

Hale,  Hon.  John  P.,  168,  174,  213,  349- 
Harlan,  Judge,  371. 
Harper's  Ferry,  264-277,  350. 
'Harrisburg,  155,  167. 
Harrison,  President  B.  F.,  371,  373.  383- 
Hawthorne,  Nathaniel,  55,  88. 
Hayden,  Lewis,  364. 
Hayes,  President,  341,  342. 
Hayti,  247,  284,  286,  324,  339,  383~392- 

«'  Heavenly  Union,"  Parody  of  Hymn  about,  67-69,  77,  104,  2. 
•'  Herald  of  Freedom,"  The,  63,  108,  109,  149. 
"  Heroic  Slave,  The,"  220. 
Higginson,  Col.  T.  W.,  267,  278,  313,  334,  373- 
Himrod's  Corners,  287. 
Hingham,  60,  101,  in. 
Holley,  Hon.  Myron,  50,  93. 
Holley,  Miss  Sally,  93,  219,  318-320. 
Homestead  Bill,  204. 
Hopedale  Community,  69,  88. 
Howard  University,  338. 
Howe,  Dr.  S.  G.,  267,  325. 
Howitt,  William  and  Mary,  137,  141,  167. 
Hugo,  Victor,  364. 
Hunter,  General,  356. 
Hutchinsons,  The,  99,  112,  113. 
Hyacinthe,  Father,  364. 

"  Independent,"  The,  272. 

Indian  Blood  of  Douglass,  7,  8,  23,  no. 

Industrial  Education,  175,  220,  221,  247,  248,  382. 

Ingersoll,  Col.  R.  G.,  354. 

International  Council  of  Women,  170,  366. 

Ireland,  115-121,  363. 

Irish  Americans,  147,  322. 

Jay,  Judge  William,  268,  269. 
Jerrold.  Douglas,  137,  147,  166, 


INDEX. 


417 


"  Jim  Crow  Car,"  81-86. 

Job,  14,  119. 

Johnson,  Oliver,  363. 

Johnson,  President,  254,  310,  312,  315,  317. 

Julian,  Hon.  G.  W.,  202,  213.  • 

Kansas,  180,  231-240,  246,  247,  250,  256,  258,  266,  278. 
Kelley,   Miss  Abby,  49,   53,  62,  63,  67,  70,  71,  79,  80,  169,  204, 

246. 

Kelley,  Wm.  D.,  300. 
Kossuth,  Lewis,  204. 

"  Lady  of  the  Lake,  The,"  35, 190. 
Latimer,  George,  74,  394. 

"Liberator,"  The,  43,  45,  49-51,  53,  60,  81,  98,  107,  113-116, 
124-127,  151,  162-166,  205,  206,  223,  232,  243,  244,  273,  279 
313. 

"Liberator,  The,"  (not  the  newspaper,)  79,  95,  115,  116. 
Liberty  Party,  The,  50,  51,  56,  66,  86,  92,  98,  109,  130,  158-160, 

168,  172-174,  178,  179,  199,  233,  249. 

"Life  and  Times  of  Frederick  Douglass,"  43,  103,  126,  201, 
220-242,   262,  301,  303,   310,  316,   324,  338,  341,    342,  34s! 
350,  351- 
Lima,  N.  Y.,  72. 
Lincoln,  President,  56,  201,  273,  278,  280,  288-290,  295,  302- 

306-313,  320,  331,  341,  349,  366,  369,  377. 
Liverpool,  115,  145,  146. 
Logan,  General,  371. 
London,   130-139,  229,  363. 
Lovett,  William,  137. 
Lowell,  J.  R.,  88,  147,  149,  173,  175,  226. 
Lynn,  Mass.,  52,  62,  77,  81,  83,  112,  152. 

McClellan,  General,  288,  296. 

Maroons,  296. 

Martineau,  Harriet,  38,  45. 

"Martyr  Age  of  the  United  States,  The,"  45-48, 


418  INDEX. 

Massachusetts,  79,  120,  273,  296-299,  343. 
Massachusetts  Anti-Slavery  Society,  43,  59,  66,  98,  102,  283. 
Mathew,  Father,  116. 

May,  Rev.  S.  J.,  45,  48,  49,  163,  214,  221,  247. 
Methodists,  40,  62. 
Mexican  War,  149,  172,  239. 
Mill,  Mrs.  J.  S.,  187. 
"  Mission  of  the  War,  The,"  306. 
"Miss  Lucretia,"  13,  14,  17,  318. 
Missouri  Compromise,  231,  236-239. 
"Miss  Sopha,"  14,  15. 
Morton,  Hon.  H.  P.,  332. 
Moslemism,  108,  292. 

Mott,  Lucretia,  49,  51,  53,  154,  169,  170,  182. 
Music,  Taste  of  Douglass  for,  26,  36,  37,  137,  339>  365- 
"My  Bondage  and  My  Freedom,"  25,  84,  103,  112,  113,   126, 
130,  204,  241-246,  250. 

Nantucket,  57-59,  70,  107. 

"Narrative  of  the  Life  of  Frederick  Douglass,"  36,  102-107, 

112,  119,  124-127,  241,  242,  343,  395. 
Neal,  John,  79. 

Negro  Exodus,  245,  286,  343-347,  3°"8. 
Negro  Problem,  vide  Problem,  the  Nation's. 
Negro  Suffrage,  61-65,  293>  299,303,306,  307,315,  33°-332> 

352-356,  392. 

New  Bedford,  36-44,  57,  76,  77,  83,  102. 
New  England  Anti-Slavery  Conventions,  70,  86,  100,  107,  153, 

299. 

New  Hampshire  Anti-Slavery  Society,  109. 
"  New  National  Era,  The,"  326. 

New  York  City,  35,  46,  152,  168,  181-185,  246,  286,  301. 
N.  Y.  State  Anti-Slavery  Society,  50,  202. 
"N.  Y.  Sun,"  The,  152,  153. 

"N.  Y.  Tribune,"  The,  88,  107,  124,  166,  248,  254,  272,  273. 
Niagara  Falls,  181. 


INDEX. 


419 


Non-Resistance,  23,  28,  43,  48,  90,  96. 
Norris,  Hon.  Moses,  73,  281. 
"  North  American  Review,"  The,  330,  349,  356. 
"North  Star,"  The,  149,  150,  161-167,   J72,  176-180,  202,  240, 
326. 

Oberlin  College*,  159,  160. 
O'Connell,  115,  116,  121,  265,  269. 
"  One  with  God  is  a  Majority,"  212. 
Owen,  Robert,  107. 

Paganini,  365. 

Parker,  Theodore,  88,  166,  187,  188,  216,  267. 

Parody  of  Hymn  about  "  Heavenly  Union,"  67-69,  77,  104,  240, 

394- 

Parody  of  Slave-holder's  Sermon,  58,  67,  93,  94,  139,  240,  394. 
Peabody,  Rev.  Ephraim,  38. 
Peace,  Cause  of,  130,  132,  179. 
Pendleton,  Ind.,  95,  96. 
Pennsylvania  Abolition  Society,  44,  331. 
Pennsylvania  Hall,  47,  52. 
Periodicals  Edited  by  Colored  Men,  149-152,  163-167,  178,  202, 

205,  206,  220,  221,  260-262,  324,  326. 
Philadelphia,  46,47,  97,  134,  136,  248,  249,  275,  286,  300,  303, 

317,  3i8,  374- 
Phillips,  Wendell,  53,  66,  67,  70,  75,  78,  83, 84, 102,  103, 107-1 10, 

178,  182-185,  l87»  !88,  191,  200,  204,  224,  227,  228,  240,  242, 

243,  267,  278,  284,  285,  296,  306,  313,  355,  391. 
Pierpont,  Rev.  John,  78. 
Pillsbury,  Parker,  56,  58,  59,  62,  108,  188. 
Pittsburgh  Convention,  210-213. 
Pittsfield,  N.  H.,  73,  391. 
Problem,  The  Nation's,  241,  358-384,  390. 
Prohibition,  351, 

Ouincy,  Edmund,  49,  164,  166,  178. 


INDEX. 


Radical  Political  Abolitionists,  247,  278,  279. 

"Ram's  Horn,"  The,  150,  152,  163. 

Remond,  Mr.  C.  L.,  75,  76,  100,  102,  107,  204,  313,  349. 

Republican  Party,  50,  56,  200,  249,  256,  273,  275,  277,  278,  280, 

312,  319,  325,  328-332,  353-360,  369-380. 
Rhode  Island,  61-65. 
Richardson,  Mrs.  Ellen,  138,  149,  161. 
Rochester,  N.  Y.,  71,  92,  117,  165,  176,  177,  186,  202,  204,  210- 

230,  267,  311,  326,  343. 
Rogers,  N.  P.,  63-65,  66,  85,  108,  109,  193. 
Rome,  365,  366. 
Rose,  Mrs.  E.  L.,  97,  169. 
Ruggles,  David,  36. 
Rynders,  Captain,  182-185. 

Sabbath,  The,  54,  89,  136. 

St.  Michael's,  18,  42,  125,  127,  342. 

Sanborn,  F.  B.,  267,  280-282. 

San  Domingo,  324,  325,  386. 

Schools,  Mixed,  38,  177,  293,  352,  381. 

"  Sclaverei  und  Freiheit,"  250. 

Scotland,  121,  139. 

Scott,  Sir  Walter,  37,  42. 

"Self-Made  Men,"  250-255,  268,  282. 

Sewall,  Hon.  S.  E.,  50,  75. 

Sewa.d,  Hon.  Wm.  H.,  174,  178,  278,  304,  336,  349. 

Seymour,  Hon.  Horatio,  323. 

Shakers,  91. 

Sheridan,  R.  B.  B.,  15. 

Sherman,  Hon.  John,  371. 

Skaneateles,  89. 

Slave-holder's  Sermon,  The,  58,  67,  93,  94,  139,  240. 

Slavery  and  the  Church,  19,  23,  25,  40-42,  48,  52-54,  67-71,  74, 
77»  79*83,  85,98-100,  104-106,  121-124,  130-132,  141,  144, 
146,  147,  202,  203,  212,  214,  216,  231,  232,  269,  319,  333,  353, 
374,384,390.391- 


INDEX.  4?1 

Slavery,  Horrors  of,   10,  11,  21,  23,  29,  47,  107,  108,  114,  117, 

118,  121,  126,  127,  208,393. 
Slavery  Illegal,  193-200,  202,  207,  208,  237,  259. 
"  Slave's  Appeal  to  Great  Britain,  The,"  290. 
"  Slave,  The  Heroic,"  220. 
Smith,  Dr.  J.  McC,  242,  247,  248. 
Smith,  Hon.  Gerrit,   50,  53,  135,   178-180,   192,  202,  211-214, 

227,  232,  242,  247,  267,  278,  280,  319. 
Socialism,  88,  97,  107,  129. 

Social  Science  Association,  The  American,  345-347. 
South  Carolina,  52,  121. 
Spartacus,  60. 

Standard,"  The   "National   Anti-Slavery,  100,   163    166    20? 

206,  223. 

Stanton,  Mrs.  E.  C,  169,  221. 
Stearns,  Major  George  L.,  267,  297,  300-303. 
Stone,  Mrs.  Lucy,  160,  219,  278. 
Stowe,  Mrs.  H.  B.,  202,  220,  221. 
Suffrage,  vide  Negro  Suffrage  and  Woman  Suffrage. 
Sudbury,  Mass.,  99. 
Suez  Canal,  365. 
Sumner,  Charles,  166,  174,  178,  205,232,  256,  298,316,324-327, 

343>  349- 

Sunday,  19,  21,  23,  364. 
Svvisshelm,  Mrs.  J.  G.  C.,  205. 
Syracuse,  N.  Y.,  86-90,  191,  192,  214,  225,  283,  285,  355. 

Talbot  County,  Md.,  9,  10,  37,  350. 
Tappan,  Lewis,  205,  247, 
Tariff,  33,  86,  128-130,  181,  218,  372,  382. 
Taylor,  Father,  74. 
Taylor,  President,  173,  177,  182. 
Temperance,  116,  130,  133-135,  179,  351,  363. 
Texas,  Annexation  of,  78,  101,  102,  168,  172,  239. 
Thompson,  George,  123,  133,  137,  147,  X88,  194,  205,  227,  243, 


422  INDEX. 

Thompson,  Mrs.  Elizabeth,  344. 
Thoreau,  Henry  D.,  276. 
Tilton,  Theodore,  318. 
Toleration,  132,  323,  333,  364. 
Truth,  Sojourner,  187,  256. 
Turner,  Nat.,  19,  264,  298. 
Tyler,  President,  65. 

"  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,"  202,  221. 
Underground  Railroad,  The,  186,  340. 
Union,  War  for  the,  200,  284. 
Utica,  N.  Y.,  46,  1 10. 

Van  Buren,  President,  50,  I72~i75>  2I2»  2I3- 

Vermont,  44. 

Vesey,  Denmark,  298. 

Victor,  N.  Y.,  71. 

"Vie  de  Frederic  Douglass,"  107. 

Wade,  Hon.  B.  F.,  281,  325. 

Wagner,  Fort,  298,  303,  305. 

Ward,  Rev.  S.  R.,  150,  178,  183-185,  202,  349. 

Washington,  D.  C.,  168,  309,  320,  339. 

Washington,  George,  228. 

Washington,  Madison,  220. 

Webster,  Daniel,  81-2,  174,  181,  188,  211. 

Webster's  Spelling-book,  15. 

Weld,  Theodore  D.,  317. 

Wendell  Phillips  Club,  The,  362. 

Western  Anti-Slavery  Society,  I57~I59-  * 

Whigs,  86,  90,  95,  158,  172,  181,  231. 

White,  Andrew  D.,  325. 

Whittier,  J.  G.,  42,  49,  5°>  52>  55,  7<>,  88,  149,  272,  374,  394. 

"  Who  Reads  an  American  Book  ?  "  54. 

Wilberforce,  293. 

William  the  Silent,  308,  333,  339. 

Wilson,  Hon.  Henry,  173,  273,  299,  303,  343,  349. 


INDEX.  423 

Winthrop,  Hon.  R.  C.,  39,  310. 

Wise,  Governor,  271,  272,  275,  282. 

Woman  Suffrage,   169-172,  179,  187,  202,  213,  221,  248,  329, 

361,  366,  367. 

Women  Allowed  to  Write  and  Speak  against  Slavery,  48,  51-53. 
Worcester,  Mass.,  174,  187,  278. 
Wright,  Elizur,  49,  188. 
Wright,  Frances,  169. 
Wright,  H.  C.,  49,  122,  137,  138,  168,  273. 


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